Two decades, but gone
in the blink of an eye.
Inside them,
the craft
applied to what could be called
making life: purposing empty
space, collecting evidence.
How finally we learned
the elusive was its own
refrain—
Each summer, those ships
with jaunty banners and sails
slipped into the harbor; and wasps
built their homely nests
before abandoning them again.
How did the bull
deep in the labyrinth sustain
himself between
each seeking?
Eventually, it too
must have learned the trick
of the crimson thread we wind
around our wrists—
How it flashes like a vein
or a capillary of ore
that tethers one measure
to another, though the distance
going in isn’t always
the same that spirals out.
