Tell me how the flowers know to reach for the sky
or the birds know to sing a morning song.
Tell me how the tide knows to roll to the shore
or the day knows to be just so long.
Tell me how my child knows there’s comfort in my arms
or my head knows something has gone wrong.
Tell me how a people learn to judge one another
or not to think and to simply go along.
Science can explain the reach of the flowers,
the tide, and the length of the days.
Psychology perhaps knows the arms of mothers
and all of their comforting ways.
There are theories I’m sure of instinct and thought
and what goes on inside of one’s head.
But the judging and the following may not be understood
until way too many are dead.
And those birds…
Tell me how.
Tori Burris Inkley
4/5/24
Tori Dreamer 