FOLLY COVE, GLOUCESTER. Sharon Casavant

On the Afternoon in the Aftermath of the Root Canal up in Lewiston

The root of the matter is crucial.

Even in as simple thing as a tooth.

Or that of the World Tree, roots reaching

deep in the realm of the underground. Heart

of the matter of language with its dirt, & clean

stones. Cistern of language I felt today, when down

by the waterfront the wind in the waves was more like weave

of a text, knowing that underneath ocean life teemed: cormorant,

seal, crab, & fish, right down to the floor of seaweed. Stood a while

taking it all in, reading the vast World, when the tanker, Leopard Moon

out of Singapore cast added daytime light on pages turning stars in the harbor.

Robert Gibbons, a former Gloucester resident, is the author of nine books of poetry. In 2013, in addition to completing a Trilogy of prose poems with Nine Point Publishing,  he published Olson/Still: Crossroad, a brief study concerning the similarities in approach to art by Olson in words, and Clyfford Still in paint.