The household of the mind

After Robert Duncan

The household of the mind paisley
Wallpapered the early fire of sunlight
Undulating on the frozen walls
Of this domain you can not so easy
Define. Here is the mind’s vague structure
A battered paint can of tools speckled
By the evidence of use. Here quill here
Horsehair here the sediment of love
Formed into the shape of a plastic
Magnifying glass. These tools we
Carry in the household of mind. More
Battered than the sunken clipper
Hooked in some odd twist of a fate
That seeks but never finds its explanation.
Watch it dangle barnacled belly
Bared to sun like the great white whale
Himself. Conquered still quivering still
Still in the wake of that early fire

Author's Note

2020