therefore wander
BY KEVIN CRAFT
That cabbage moth fluttering
like loose ends or an old itch in the vagus
nerve finds the underside of a spirea leaf
to cling to
at the garden end of a windy
day—and then? Long night.
Let’s not worry about plot.
Restlessness carries you
from leaf to leaf, the moon shines
on your deeds, good
and bad. To investigate what’s at stake
for a moth scrawling its nervous
syllogism from porch light to candle
and back, carrying the singe
of proximity with it,
approximating the breadth of the material
world in its stark
abandonment of principle, its even
underhandedness, requires no scapegoat,
no backstory
of blindness and scorn to cut through
to the inevitable
avalanche, the white-out conducive
to moving through fog
to figure grounded in fog
to disfigurement. Each time
I hold out my hand,
you escape.
