By Rodney Jones

Moving the box carefully because it might break
Or is so heavy anyone might get hurt carrying it 

Awkwardly because one is always slighter 
And struggling to get small hands placed under it, 

And what are the chances they are in the vicinity
Of a hornet’s nest, solicitor, or snarling dog? 

Not to speak of impediments, bumps in the sidewalk,
Narrow steps, the blind ascent of a little hill— 

O it is especially difficult when the weight shifts
And the one in front who is walking backward 

Breaks step but laughs when they finally set it down,
Open it and spread the parts out on the rug 

Though some of the parts they need are missing 
And the instructions translated from another language.

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Rodney Jones is the recipient of the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award and a finalist for the Griffin International Poetry Prize and the Pulitzer Prize. His new book, The Body and the End of Time: Poems Selected and New, is forthcoming in 2026 from Louisiana State University Press. He lives in New Orleans.