Chris Speckman

Q.E.D.

he can't understand
the origami
of his daughter's arms,
her current love:
hurling, the thrill of
sport! factorial,
another rah-rah
permutation of pitch,
ball & stick. abandoned
in the bleachers, he chokes
on vocab, camán? sliotar?
his brogue, a bad joke.
nothing left to smooth
the dog-eared memory
of the once-candied

apple of his eye
divining her future
as an astronaut,
embellishing her bike
helmet with phosphorescent
constellations. he checks
his rolex, his consolation
prize for a life's work,
flattens the schedule's
diaphanous axis,
subtracts the mechanical
pencil from his chest
protector to scrutinize
the proof that a piece
of paper folded 42 times

would reach the moon.

Chris Speckman is an adjunct professor at Butler University, where he received his MFA. He is the assistant editor for Booth: A Journal. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in PANK, Word Riot, Harpur Palate, Rust + Moth, and the anthology It Was Written: Poetry Inspired by Hip-Hop.