“excuse me—why?”
the boy asked the sky,
which hung (unspurred
) on the penultimate word.
“excuse who?—and why?”
: the sky’s dead reply,
which seemed to the boy (
unamused) a bit coy.
“but I asked you first!”
: shouted (want) to the blue.
“if the roles were reversed,
I’d answer you!”
(if the rules were reversed)
“who’d answer who?” —like
the play was rehearsed—
it taunted the tyke.
at once the boy burst,
and (shrill as a shrike
)he shouted and cursed
at the sky, and—unlike
his father, who knew
that the boy wasn’t the sky,
and the sight from the view
—the boy cast his eye
invariably nearward,
as if towards a toy,
and the being was blurred,
and the sky stabbed the boy.