SCRIMSHAW TRINKET
It’s the past that tells us who we are. Without it
we lose our identity. – Stephen Hawking
A raven carried heaven-manna
out of the ark to lonesome
Jonah – him just come
from under the whale-rib (manna
overboard) stranded on sand
off Galilee, RI –
& it made him cry.
Those crispy cackles he couldn’t
understand – like low gull-talk
sent through a black-
hole paradox;
light straw climbed an orange rock
from the event horizon up to
null infinity –
it was all catenary,
looped in one wave-smile... – who?
Gravity? – or Grace? Eurydice,
maybe. (It was her cave.)
Spoiled meat you crave
is portioned by division – say,
two doves for every plowman’s mule.
Queequeg in his casket
(like a scrimshaw trinket)
penned our sempiternal Rule –
each rustic Penny in the well of night
was tender out of love.
Her vernal sparkle-trove
is polyglot – Euphrasia (eyebright).
6.8.16
Monk's Mound (Illinois)
