A Shortened Day

Em Kibler

“What goes on four feet in the morning, two feet at noon, and three feet in the evening?” – The Riddle of the Sphinx


I broke the Sphinx’s riddle too early in life. 

The answer is human, who crawls 
in the morning, walks at noon, 
and when their life comes to an end, 
uses a cane. But in the morning, my four limbs 
were not able to crawl, the metal 
braces trapping and twisting my legs 
to make me fit into the same mold 
as the rows of babies swaddled 
in pink and blue. And later 
when my legs and life 
were straight, I watched my dad hurl a bowed 
plank from the backyard deck 
onto the splintering pile of rejects 
that, unlike me, weren’t worth fixing.

If the riddle is me, then my three legs—
two made of flesh, torn and bruised, 
and one a long piece of metal, bowed 
from my weight, connected at the hand 
and not the hip—are marching 
me forward toward a delayed 
grave. Too young to die but 
too old for true sympathy. I won’t 
make a wish and my bills won’t be paid 
by the tv hospitals that commercialize 
a child’s pain, because I am not 
a child. Yet not quite an adult.
But hopefully, 
my funeral will be full—a tribute 
to the girl woman who died 
too soon, 
but not soon enough.

The back deck, once unflawed
and renewed, is bent again
and so am I. But this time I can’t be fixed
with steel braces and a firm hand. And I’m told
the deck is too far gone
to be worth saving as well. Together,
the wood and I will trudge proudly out
of the evening toward the end
of the riddle. And maybe we will learn
what happens at night.