How heavily it sits on one—
the chewing of the cud,
the pastoral.

How it wanders toward the road
where fancy grates trap
the animal, keep bovines

pulling grass up by the roots,
chewing, chewing and swallowing,
regurgitating to swallow again.

Of its four stomachs—which of them,
the hardy soul would ask,
is meant for thought?

It pervades summer,
the sense of being lost in a supermarket,
the boats with loud wakes

and neighbors blaring noise.
In the end, cousin to obsession,
one step from fantasy,

the ruminant becomes her own world,
including that sky where astronomers
camped near cattle

will sip hot chocolate,
will see the Perseids.
They fondle their black scopes

all night long.
They conjure the phantoms
and the alchemy.