At noon, the kite came down.
Not falling—folding—
its blue paper buckled at the spine,
its tail caught hard in the pear tree.
5
One wooden spar gave a dry crack.
The string went slack in my hand.
Above me, the open air kept moving.
Below, I gathered every piece.
Upstairs, where the rafters held their dusk,
10
scissors whispered; silk thread slipped
in small, soft circles through the tear.
I pressed each wrinkle flat with flour paste.
Scrape, snip, stitch: the sounds were slight,
but steady as mice behind a wall.
15
Across the blue, I laid a crimson patch,
bright as a coal that would not cool.
I blamed the wind for wanting ruin,
as if each gust had teeth,
as if the clouds had set a trap,
20
as if the sky disliked what climbed.
I tied new knots too tight with anger.
The frame bent under my careful hands.
A thing can break from being held
as surely as from being hurled away.
25
Then I stopped hiding the jagged seam.
I trimmed the patch into a narrow river
running red from wingtip down to tail.
The tear became its winding bank;
the knots, small bridges crossing over.
30
What had looked like damage in the dusk
looked, by lamplight, almost like a map.
I let the paste dry without my touch.
At dawn I climbed the hill again,
and waited while the grass blades leaned.
35
No command could make the stillness open.
Then one cool current lifted,
pulled
the mended frame against the string—
not free of me, not mine to steer,
40
but drawing me a step uphill.
Higher, the red river flashed and vanished,
flashed and vanished as the kite turned.
Now the wind seemed less a set of teeth
than breath entering a paper lung.
45
I loosened my grip to give it room.
The line hummed low along my thumb.
I had blamed the wind for every break;
I thanked it now for testing every knot.
At noon, the kite came down once more,
50
not folding now, but circling—
a blue wing carrying its red river
slowly through the pear tree’s shade.
The string grew slack inside my hand.
The open air kept moving overhead.
55
This time, I did not gather broken pieces.
I gathered the line, and left the sky.