The waking hour. Silver light through the trees
and a high moan of boxcars dopplering.
The house asleep. The baby breathing.
Fear at my throat. Or at least loss,
for tempus fugit: that old chestnut.
Perhaps we could Peter Pan, forever moving west.
Or maybe, as the poet said, west is Everywhere.
A verb: we west ourselves; I west you.
Look around: a rattle of voices and coffee cups.
A sloping hill and a room full of sun. A map.
Your comfortable shoes. Even the dish declares:
This pattern will not fade.
Remain, and out the oracle’s eyes.
We are an island: reprise.
(Originally published as “This pattern will not fade,” in Handfuls of Bone, Gaspereau Press, 2012)
