ON A THEME BY J.H. PRYNNE

It is limitless its myriad
virulence: it is to be
poor, to have no pelt 
for certain things, either
what is necessary
or what is barren exilic pleasure.

It is the look the son gives
the father as disappointment
at shared blood, hopelessness,
the brick fence of failure,
winding brick-nestled up
a low winter field to a singular tire
obscured by bits of white blanket
cold hauled from across the lake.

It is pure is longing. There
no map, suddenly only
an astonishment. We shall know
sour limbs creaking, leaves
sere above root.  Honor
thy father, thy mother, thy
unlocated self: the hard
demands made by winds
dumbly blasting futile boots.

And it is in some transience of
light where change hangs heavy
in pockets, where laughter
crowds the rictus of humiliated
adulation and ardor a flesh in flux.