What Comes After

Reconstituted voices, scraps of cloud caught in branches, the morning campfire of Pu-erh tea or mown hay of white peony, an old man’s blaser hanging on its peg, the human funk of toasted cumin seeds, oak burnt to ashes, cinerulent fox fur, crapy grape leaves in late November, a shirred old pumpkin, the soap and pepper of walnut hulls, the must of summer clothes left out through fall, the shadow of a straw hat  hooked on a chair back, Parcheesi’s orphaned pawn, the clatter of thick French china, Bordeaux of old furniture, the frazzle of a bee, A above middle C, oaks in spring bright as lettuce, butter and apricot of chanterelles, brine on stone after a storm, the smell of lake water, and all night, the tentative knock  of a hull against the dock.  

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