It has its ways and means and laws
and often opens up to us.
It grants us Monday its applause
while making Tuesday squirm and pause
and fuss.
Although its mind is all its own,
it lets us enter into it.
At times it’s something tossed or thrown,
at times an entity unknown
we must intuit.
Its history is rather dim;
its birthright, of uncertain age.
Deep ancestry or modern whim?
Is this a trunk or root or limb?
Its whole we cannot gauge.
We pause for stretches at a time
when, lo, it seems to disappear
and Art degenerates to slime.
It suddenly ain’t worth the climb.
We’ll make the trek again next year.
Our work with it goes on and on.
This line we prune, this verse omit.
Is this the well from which we’re drawn?
We are indeed its mortal spawn.
It’s drawn as much from us as we from it.