Family Circle

They are circling, snapping, offset by one,

offset by two,

                      the Pleiades of light

they lifted out of, long gone.

Or you see the saw

that history makes with family, sitting up straight

at the table. My, my—

that’s a lovely knit

to your bones, some aunt says.

                              The light, now about as far off

as premature death, keeps flickering,

to hell with the I’s.

                 Why assume consanguity?

Stealing thunder, that’s why.

I’m related to the man who

                                or let me go, my blood says,

banking.

The light’s

full of hovering, the lifted off

                                defining family.

                                You suck

is differentiation, a mouthful

of Other, then muck happens.

So be it:

                                all of them lit

in the corridor.