Like deserts -- sand over dirt over wetlands -- expand,
dryness takes the body, mother and baby, that small
circle dilates for one more gestation but
the filling of spaces only makes us
dry again, borders become us as we overtake space,
name protection as the reason --

building and speaking
sound, but no meaning

Like creosote on a track tie bubbles up, sticks sole
to surface just until you lift a foot, it holds you to dead
wood but won't let you in as words stay but the elements
can only come this far.

On live wood wind beats back thickening bark, oppression
is expansion and limits back against
the spring until the father no longer
circumscribes his family but countries and
the world, and bigger than this are the samples, pick a
branch from the same tree and listen as
sprouts reach away and away.