Fog bunches tulle around streetlamps
and tats droplets into the netting of our hair.
Ladies who make lace go blind, it’s
a hazard of the trade, “white eye.”
Pulling threads into fleurs-et-oiseaux
that swarm indistinguishable, no matter;
when the veil trembles back off the face
no one is dividing the beaks from the thorns.
Half our lives, more, we’ve been figuring
our attending tasks would grant reward
in permanent throne or at least some place to stand—
to be occupied by him as he occupies himself.
But particulate air, thicker than snow,
blinds the mind gone clear cold for its own devising.