by the seat of my broom

[zirconium]

Hanging onto my hourglass-sand-scoured ride
as it swerves and dips, wrenches and screeches
its way through the jagged turn of this year
onto the fog-wreathed bridge of the next --

the first of many gauntlets waiting ahead.
Some may well dissolve with huffing and puffing
but I have seen what straw can devour --

like plague, like lava -- as it fans out within flames,
rippling, ripping everything near the fury
into indiscernable ruins. Ninety years hence --

or just nineteen, or hell, even nine --
this story will be ancient, all too possibly buried
beneath triumphant lies. But meantime, meanwhile -- time notwithstanding --

meanness must be countered, rugs rolled away
for air to meet rot, hearths unwalled
to hands trained in mending and measuring what's true.




==

For another stare-and-riff inspired by this site, see Frames at Vary the Line.