34.
Slag, chrome, the transNeptunian detainee
   crumbling walls in the night thud

Roads that change their courses as
   you return upon them, gerrymander

By a sputtering candle grammarians drink
   from square goblets of malachite

Sagging, shiny, black polyurethane
   now seals the car window broken at the theft

We would write on ourselves for that day
   curviangular letters of dripped henna

A terrain abandoned, neither wild
   nor civilized, in the bleak aftermath

They stiffen & grow stubbornly silent
   for any question requiring them to think

Vats in which the makings ferment
   that will someday be sonorous kimchee

Gray cypress to build with, here in the pall
   where all lesser woods turn deliquescent