In the Study, with the Candlestick

“How Parents Can Keep Kids Busy (and Learning) in Quarantine: as American schools close, parents are suddenly faced with the challenge of keeping their children occupied at home.” The Atlantic, March 16, 2020

Light catches in the dusty
window, crawls with juniper
shadows to night.
How slow we can go. How
many games we can play in one
day, week, months.

Cupboard forgotten cards
and pawns of childhood—
our own, our kids’—
sketch us just so, a study
of character, the revelation
and concealment

of hands, the microdistance
eyes travel to read motive,
intention, alliance.
Cardboard arenas of little
consequence: what we do, are
willing to do

to win, to lose, to anticipate
and thwart another’s loss
at personal cost,
to play and play until everyone
wins, everyone shouts YES!
at least once.