overheard at Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port

***

not that i ever

let inauspicious autotrophs

rise and galavant gaily off in

victorious procession–

but still it is with

faint water, pale water, icy

bereft of vitamin and conciliatory coos and

soothes) vinings lovely walls do make

here fed upon flesh and vein and

in their season, fail to

bud. lurking behind is still

swimming in sprinkling flicks of

light and washing only in pieces

and bits, hands before a meal.

still– perhaps a trellis could be too

a ladder and not

merely a series of exes

or a closed and creased book of

“how not to”

***