ACROSS FROM HAMMACHER SCHLEMMER

It may be better not

knowing what to believe

than to know

what is supposed

to be believed.

To weigh god and science,

reason and anarchy,

destiny and accident,

myth and history, is to fall

into the mind of the haunted

Chicago cab driver

who carries on the family

tradition of being alone.

One more person

out of the loop and the circle

closes like the spring

clasp of a bracelet.

My father died and that

causes me to question

why I ask.

It may be better not

to pinpoint believers

and non-believers.

The lines are long on both sides.

There will be good times,

there will be the rest of time.

Strange, how we can live

here and not know our way around.

Linda Back McKay is a Minneapolis poet, writer and teaching artist. Her work has appeared in Great River Review, Water~Stone, and elsewhere. Her poetry collections are Ride That Full Tilt Boogie (2001 North Star Press) and The Cockeyed Precision of Time (2007 White Space Press).