Tim Suermondt

ONE OR THE OTHER OR MANY

At times I’m sure the universe is expanding,
at times I’m sure it’s contracting.

This is akin to my believing in God
when things are going well,

not believing when they’re not—
the elasticity of certainty as frustrating

as it is magical with possibilities.
That boat on the river—is it going somewhere,

everywhere, nowhere? Who knows?
Do I see women in bikinis on the deck

or a couple of old salts hunched along the railing?
This slow dancing with my wife

in the kitchen—is it for me, for her, for us both?
One step too far, one step not far enough

can change the earth as much as any amount
of ergs dropping like eggs into a bowl—

precisely random, care and abandon,
spinning the plates like the stars.



Tim Suermondt has published two full-length collections of poems. His next book will be coming out in the Spring of 2016 from Glass Lyre Press. He has poems forthcoming shortly from Ploughshares, Jam Tarts and the Backwaters Anthology, among others. He lives in Cambridge (MA) with his wife, the poet Pui Ying Wong.