Panacea

We live with glass flowers instead of flowers
that wilt light. Dinosaurs once owned the scene.

I hardly need to mention them to catalog
their numbered bones. A clock flashes on.

I’ll tell you how it will work. Nothing
is more likely to lead to an H-bomb

than the specter. We live in the air death has—
a tightened belt. The individual is some thing

we share until it hurts. I’ll tell you
how it will work. I would leave with you.

The path of life is strewn with bones
and the question is stirring. Nothing recounted

could assure intent hangs a lantern
or hope finds a horse.