In a pine grove


Walking a pine grove
whose russet floor is kept by shade,
an itinerant crushes the carapace
and its resin of curing needles.
The palmer's way is led by no worn path,
no fixed allée, no maze of moss
nor long-enchanted root.
Only an open floor and a free swaying air,
only taking the pulse of the wood,
counting on a tutelary step,
and the hushed goodwill of evergreens.

Chance sun will show a body where to stay
before a shining web, lines played out from
some orb spider's holy gut — the creature
for the whole of life bound to a protean line.
Diffuse in the weald, invisible weavings,
that old-fashioned repair,
are ever spun from underbellies:
Silk glands! The spinnerets!
Bright as a sudden penny in the pines,
these silky lines are nursery,
are tensile web for germination,

are the lines of hibernation,
the lines for the binding of prey,
for escaping the hungry bluebird,
for sensing and sending a signal,  
for flying on the wind (once into the sails
of Darwin’s fathoming Beagle),
for ballooning to and from oblivion,
for matting the earth in Fall
in showers of shed silk:
that's gossamer! —
the lines of a practical transport.  

First published in Homage (Ebb Tide Editions, 2024)
Homage Travel Stories & Essays | Poems | Contents at-a-Glance