I tighten a gift for you

•

I tighten a gift for you
and the ivy across the street
slipping through my fingers
—for just an instant a fuse
stretching along the bricks
and workers below
have decided to open a mountainside

—it's a small thing, the string
absorbing your gift
as if there will always be a wall
ready to fall and in winter the leaves
year to year remember
their same shape
and never any taller, know
exactly where and you
still living in another city

—I'm mailing you what it means
not to know, that in my hands
even cardboard has an edge
even string reaches an end
—you will open this box
and clearly a great :the knot
not any other place.