14 Jul 2025 2 min read poetry

Rock should Rest

The rock should rest, rocks rest, resting is what a rock does. It presses into dirt and the dirt presses back and call that stillness. They said cage, but they meant iron, and they said iron, but they meant hold—meant grip, meant proved control. And the holding was never quite letting, and the letting was never quite go.

There is a rope, and the rope is a loop, and the loop is a knot, and the knot is a question no one will untie under the weight of rock. The rock is inside now. The iron says inside. The rope stays above. The earth says nothing, because the rock no longer listens. It was low. Pressed in. The rock remembers the low like a word knows the wax it sealed. A sureness.

But now there is no press, and no sureness. The hold is a hold is an oath is a sentence is a hold. The rock does not touch. The rock is held. And the hold is not a hand. The rock is presumed innocent; it will never be allowed to rest again.

Then time takes the cage with rust, and the hold rusts away.

Thirty or more years of forever. The rock went nowhere waiting to rest.

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