A tiny spider / caught / under brown bark / of a thin slash pine…

and I choose not to brush my wet hair, / allowing it to tussle into Margaret Fuller’s / clematis wreath woven on the banks / of the Concord, mid-German translations…

The word petr, in ancient Greek, encompasses
the broad spectrumof rock; when granite, or shale,
or limestone or quartzite, basalt, gypsum or chalk
meets a rainy ichor, then the rarified essence…

I jolt awake to a syrup-sweet voice over the loudspeaker. My fellow passengers and I rub palms to faces, emerge from a hundred dreams, and blink away the stupor. I check my watch. Close to midnight. I stare dumbly at the small placard directly in front of me, eye-level. Literature only.