Project-ile

The poet sits with intention.
Knitted brow and with a scrap of
paper, a sharp implement and a
momentary departure, a faraway gaze,

the poet observes the words taking their own
positions simply as
falling
into place.

The poet lines up the marks and cross-
hatches, rounds up loops and keeps it all
justified, inside the margin(al) notes,
deducing answers by guess and check.

With so many alternates and messy remainders
that carry over into the wrong
problem,
we are easily led astray with too many steps
to count.

The poet prefers no word to another,
making it impossible to say anything
of value about luck or music, or talent,
or art or war or philanthropy or money.

In shorthand scrawls,
the poet draws out
the sharpest tips acquired and
compares this craft to the fine work
such as that of the carpenter or accountant,
or tailor or assassin,
whom measure thrice before a cut is made.

The poet shook his wrist.
The poet knew there were solutions inside
so he sought and tried
to say the one thing that would change
something.
The poet goes with the flow of ink
and arrives quickly
in a foreign tundra
where the virgin snow melts
around slated and craggy ideals.

The poet watches the footfalls
disappear,
grateful to have never been
Here.


Advertising illustration credited by 'Bookseller & Stationer', The Sawn Pen, 1919 in Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons.