Pre-Text

(for Douglas, at one) Archaic, his gestures hieratic, just like Caesar or Sappho or Mary’s Jesus or Ann’s Mary or Jane Austen once, or me or your mother’s you the sudden baby surges to his feet and sways, head forward, chin high, arms akimbo, hands dangling idle, elbows up, as if winged. The features of his face stand out amazed, all eyes as his aped posture sustains him aloft a step a step a rush and he walks, Young Anyone, his lifted point of view far beyond the calendar. What time is it? Firm in time he is out of date— like a cellarer for altar wines tasting many summers in one glass, or like a grandmother in whose womb her granddaughter once slept in egg inside grandma’s unborn daughter’s folded ovaries.