THE DOOR

by Kevin McNulty

Begins in your refusal, nothing
too precious or precise. Begins
in winter, haunts the doors
of your incandescent periphery, lovely

askings, garlanded star to star.
Begins in your refusal—
the door is a gift, you open
full of invitations, intimations, full of 

cut flowers. The door is in the evening,
leads into the wilderness, leans against the sky.
The door is a poem, you open in-

to a room like winter, cold but 
familiar, half-lived, wanting.

Born and raised in Boston, Kevin McNulty works at the University of Massachusetts Club, where he can fix you a drink.