metal, the ore in the mountain, exists,
darkness in mine shafts, milk not let down
from mothers’ breasts, an ingrown dread where
whisperings exist, whisperings exist
the cells’ oldest, fondest collusion
consider this market, consider this import
and export of fathers, half bullies
half tortured soldiers, consider
their barren last vanishing, metal
to metal, as the amount of unsown maize
grows and the water shortage grows
speak now of mildness, now of the mystery
of salt; speak now of mediation, of mankind, of
courage; tell me that the marble of banks
can be eaten; tell me that the moon is lovely,
that the extinct moa eats green melon,
that merriment exists, is thriving,
that moss animals and mackerel shoals exist, that
means of giving up, of descent, exist, and
physical portioning out, as in poems, of matchless
earthly goods, that pity exists