Phibby Venable
THEORIES

Here are all the days swept up into a hearth fire
of theories talked to ashes
the cold grey of old ideas scattered
among the rose roots
From a window I watch the weather
navigate a river that moves south
in all seasons
tumbling pollen, ice, fallen leaves
slipping over the rocks to speed
past small, human madness
toward the stray caress of an infinite sea
Once at the beach I turned a shell shaped
in a suggestion of small mountains
I pushed it downward with a bare foot
to fill the hollows where I stood
with sand and salt
slicing my heel on a shovel piece
some child had lost.