As a kid jumping rope,
at some point you noticed
the arc hanging in the air
for an instant, and over and over

You left all those curved lines
sequential, stacked like a riff of playing cards
behind you as your image got bigger

All those imagined helices
are the only accountancy
It’s okay to think we were all similar
or that we had all read the rules

For instance, someone invented a baffle
for the vent pipe of a stove
in a caboose of a train.

You want even the odd people
to like you;  you will make sure of it.
At the end, maybe you will still
be able to see their hands and their mouths

When soon you have dropped away, completely empty,
perhaps you will forget everything except the first thing
and you will see the other side of the rope, or not.