It's a fishery of looks that swallows us,
squared away in our fenced-off station.
Cypress as sentry, an entanglement straight
to the gully: sharp-toothed wild vine and

bindweed. To the lifeline, a knife:
a clearing away of excess, the short
stick, the hogwash, the tit for tat. You,
with your insider's word; I, with a stumbler's

gaited mouth. Fireside, shadows turn clocks
around your face. We're two
for the time. You're a window; I'm a floor,
dense as a diamond-within-coal, clotted

as new-spun felt. The muddy plains of the heart.
The acres we've crossed, the acres we have not.