Travelogue

Port of origin: Parts unknown.

To be alone
as all living things are alone
secluded, if not in placement
then in soul.

To bear a mind-sewn quilt
stitched in the steady and unsteady
hand of the senses.

To wear a mantle
of inseparable flesh
and know someday you will be parted.

To fight with intangible why,
run with, to, or from intangible
why and watch it endless elude.

The plot of the weave
of a fabric softener sheet
and the fractal arms of a spiral galaxy
equal in mystery.

The incoming birdsong,
the rabbit's movements in the overgrown yard,
the unexpected chemical burn of love
equally out of control.

I did not puncture the window screen.
I did not make the screen.
I did not make the air and light
passing through the puncture.
I did not even make this eye,
or the ink, or the language.

To inherit all the world from past
and dwell in a body of luck.

To crew this shell of compounded fortunes
appointed by chance, fated to choose.

To send forth ships like leaf skeletons
and wait for word of other shores.

To grow drowsy with the effort
of such metaphysic alchemy.

To put the pen down
with nothing resolved.