Lie Detection by Taryn Schwilling

I ask the past to unhand me  
why ask      for the past lies 

why again do those who know
nothing of horses insist on 
penning them   I drag at my own fore-
lock romantically     look it up

my one good memory might be false   

the bay mare on her side
in the dew green     she set
her hooves still for me for she
knew things we all know only 
animals aware themselves of

every set of steps leads back 
to one maple tree  wherein I hid 
bark-bent      I doubled and in 
doubling I blanked both the green
dew and the dark swelling it-
self below

though my hands were free I feared
the pulse curve and my own eye’s
black pulsed blacker than the earth 
beneath the probable mare