—after Emily Dickinson
told, "is composed of nows,"
but unfortunately, now
is also flooded
with forevers—
and the only way
we know of to endeavor
to cross over
from one specious present
to the ill-defined next is
to caulk the twin wagons
of hope and regret
and attempt to ford
(via brute summation)
the biblical river
of pleasure-
cum-pain
which has burst the cheap
dam of this
same time and place
and laid waste
to that oasis from horizon
to horizon.
But the hell of it is:
the place to which we
think we might escape
is just another maddeningly
familiar-looking junction
between that which can
neither be found
nor forgotten.
