Certainly, O Dark-Souled Dane, a hintish
tickle of rank and foetid currents
weeping beneath your kingdom’s feet, but have
you, Unsettled Prince, sensed what stirs
across the ocean? A waft of acrid faith
twined with sourful pride beneath a haze
of festerous free, towering rot. Not some
thing, but many. Many things.
Look askance, all you
want, at a people who
draped their cats as
queens, in gold and lapis
and jasper and jade,
or shaved their eyebrows
in lamenting grief when
their whiskered royals
sauntered through Duat to
bask beneath Ra’s passing,
but have you, a lap
among a sea of laps, ever
been so richly blessed by
an ambivalent god brushing
against your shins?
Billy Collins doesn’t
have a Twitter account so
you’ll have to follow him
more craftily. Not
in his footsteps, but
slightly to the right or
farly to the left, or
with binoculars as he
serpentines through an alpine
pass, hoping you never find
the map he left crumpled
beneath the coffee grounds.
His single sheet
of lined paper
was aligned with his
single pencil
which rested atop
his single table which
wobbled next to mine.
And though his hands
were folded, waiting,
and though his eyes
were fixed, unwavering,
into space, I think
I was more expectant.