Malena Mörling: "Happiness"

How far away is your happiness?
            How many inches?
How many yards?
            How many bus rides to work
and back?
            How many doorways
and stairwells?
            How many hours
awake in the dark
            belly of the night
which contains
            all the world’s bedrooms,
all dollhouse-sized?
            How far away is your happiness?
How many words?
            How many thoughts?
How much pavement?
            How much thread
in the enormous sewing machine
            of the present moment?

"Happiness" by Malena Mörling, from American Poetry Now, edited by Ed Ochester. © University of Pittsburgh Press, 2007.

Photograph: Untitled, by Elizabeth Krumbach (originally color, horizontal).