This expedition
means thinking bearables,
scrutinizing each day bouncing at me
like tumbleweeds
in West Texan lifetimes
where faces stand motionless
'round Indian myths

This expedition
involves hitting on life forms
limited to earning their keep
and stuffing themselves with nutrients;
eat-and-shit machines
going on about manic deities
prescribing exactly how they prefer being pleased

This expedition
concerns the tripping and stumbling
through an apparent sameness,
slowly rotating
in the illusive manner of Rileyan keyboard studies

This expedition wears down your pencil
like it wears down your stock of presence
somewhere between here and now,
while you're dangling dangerously
at the end of a suiting opinion
and some hastily scrambled neighborliness

This expedition will eventually slide,
heavy with attitudes and conventions,
into morgues
and beat-up stories for heirs;
fanciful let-ups and lowdown letdowns
in livelihoods caught on tape

Yes, this expedition
tracks down the most recent full-time
in sameness and days

I sport a drafty pencil
through these lulls,
ad hoc and ex tempore

This expedition
has invisibility hanging from trees,
unavoidables seeping through time units

I listen to birds out in the pines
and acknowledge the bony structures
of my hands

The chirping and the fingers
reach some kind of consensus

The morning makes a point
of each measure
in Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again,
on repeat down in the living room

I hear the cranes calling
out of the back of my life

Certain aspects move about
in adjacent ideas

My body is the only outfit I need

I turn my back on my behind
without further ado,
and surge ahead
like a surfer's dream,
unfolding