about why she isn’t
in either state drugged, dragged
the days being blear, limpid, contrary
indeterminant as a ship by night
passing a blind light, you could
be justified by awe but she
slides past you anyway through her gulf
of intermittent breathing while you paddle
down your watery aisle of chance
with no advantage except your late
developed skills of shuffling thoughts and
subterfuge and hungry sudden options –
your hands alive but confused as fish
in a pond where the pond does all the whirring
and time wheels asymptotically, resistive
as ambition or coordinated histories
or the mulch of kind thoughts now with no regrets.