The Moment That We Fall

Everyone recalls,

if they’re lucky,

that second they

fell in love. When the clouds

played spin-the-

bottle with the sun.

If it rained

like Niagara mist,

gusts to bring a

cerf-volant aloft. Everything

sounds better in the

French. Even détester.

Where are all the poems

of flash & hate?

Is that plunging

still unscribed? Does the heart

thump in reverse? Sweat back-

pedal, water morph to ice

in summer’s sear?

No one does a cartwheel

when they’ve lost.

Uncork Moët

Chandon 

when they are crushed.

Maybe that

explains

my F in gym; when Jade said

god, I hate your guts.

I could never skip

a rope right after that.

Stumbling on un-

done laces

like the tails of

bouncing rats.

Years later,

I soothe your sun-

burnt forearm with my

stroke. Note the

loop of white

in lieu of ring—

I forgot it

after dishes—

this trudge in

Springbank Park

on solstice eve,

when our hands un-

clasp in twinkles,

your feigning

some phantom itch,

a mosquito that is

starved, blood once

there then gone.

Andreas Gripp

September 20, 2025

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