Life is a plan B,
perhaps something to fall back on,
or something to resign oneself to;
a scratch in the record,
a leftover set piece from a turkey film,
or a bardo caused by bad karma;
something to get through,
get away from, break free of

Or is it a stage to be staged upon;
a moment with infinite prefixes
and eternal implications;
a watchtower higher than heaven;
a fusion-powered journey between the stars;
an inexhaustible stroke of luck in misfortune;
a creativity-starved tabula rasa;
a calm in seasoned years,
a godless religion in the realms of entrails;
an exciting day-by-day
interleaved with star-bright nights;
diaries in DNA code and invisible ink
out here
in the aftermath of 13.8 billion years of evolution;
Big Bang still roaring
in love of every kind;
in faces glowing in sleep
and names never forgotten;
the cup of coffee smoothly balanced
and painlessly quick-stepped
up the semi-spiral of the wooden stairs,
toward paper and pen and this poem;
the house bathed in the morning sun of Northbothnia