The world is a little softer after these three poems; I think I can fold it and turn it and dig into it, excavating a little nest to hide in. I can stash my grief in there and move on when I’m ready. By ikea logic I’ll leave by digging out the other side. 

To soften the world you have to start with an impossibility and make it as familiar as the woods behind your father’s house. That’s an impressive feat of poetry. I’m in that treehouse, too, sitting in a feeling that is not fantastical like absolution nor biblical like forgiveness. Instead, a

quiet understanding. 

To soften the world you have to be soft with yourself. I’ve been high in a big box store before so I know what it’s like to face an aisle full of lamps head on. After these poems, I’m able to take my hand in my hand and lead myself to safety. I can call myself on the phone to tell myself, it’s okay to freak out and why don’t you take a really warm shower. Peeling off old skin is a way of staying in motion, too.

To soften the world you have to be in love. Love is the most important because it softens time. These poems have afterimages -- you stare at something long enough and it appears under your eyelids. We love dead loved ones before and during and after dying, into the future tense. “I loved” is an action taken in the present. I’m grateful to meet Debbie. I’m grateful to these poems for telling the truth; that the size of a mother is approximately the size of the pope. 

I’m nearly out from the other side of my burrow. Like the speaker, in some ways, I’m a bit of a squirrel. A triptych is so satisfying, and each with a three-lettered title, too! It’s difficult not to repeat myself, because these poems gently steer me back each time my attention flickers away. But I’m craving asymmetry after the unnatural roundness found in the second poem. I’m setting off fireworks from the exit of my burrow. A lot happens, and nothing happens all the time.