A Warning To Navigators

Who do you hope to fool
with this talk
of destinations?

Now that the earth's
an orange;
not a bed, or table,
where things might be prepared
begun
or ended,

paths that looked straight enough
on charts
prove circular.

The skin shows signs
of rottenness inside.
Armies of ants
converge around the rind.

Travellers chase their tails
at the ocean's wheel.
We see the lights too late,
and feel again
the shudder of stranded hulls
beneath our keel.

-- Patricia Glensor

Sarsvati: om mani padme hum