Accidental Beauty

If you can’t think
of anything, put the cap back
on. Don’t let it dry up
for good. To be

too poised is poison. That opening
in the woods

where you veered
off the path is the true
hinge to it. Don’t forget
to swing without occasion.

Glare

To panic about ice
yet to form, comments yet
to be made, technology
yet to break down,
a Coleridge poem printed

and not read
is to be most afraid
of how serendipity dances
across pavers—
cracked or not.

Chilled by indecision—even a bad choice brings on
summer momentum. I might

go out after
dark. Could swallow flavored water while the camera

runs. Staged accidental
encounters are the new absence

of light
when I dig deep enough into this primitive season.

To memorize obstruction,
or just its possibility
in debris flying from men
working, hidden patches of ice
on a side street side
walk, breaks

serendipity
into slivers too thin
to support the weight
of hope, too sharp
to be ignored.