(After a workshop with John Wellwood)

Words raised up from the deep

like reclaimed treasure,

encrusted, barnacled,

strands of kelp

and an old boot

hangi from a syllable.

 

You have to soil your hands,

to say anything

as if smuggling diamonds

in a sack of coal.

Three agents man the customs gate–

the inspectors of logic and grammar

and the special agent for word choice.

They check my bag.

“Have you nothing to declare?” they ask.

I’m scared but keep on going.

Later,l the smugglers gather

at the old round tavern in the woods

and brush the soot from one another’s coats.

Diamonds lay everywhere in the dust.