Sisyphus Loses Track
D. R. James
His round trips triggered the technology
of counting: clouds, moons, planets, galaxies,
his rank breaths dusting the eternal groove.
But erasure of future, easing of
scars inflicted playing strung-up puppet
to the gods, echo sweet gestures tendered
like rain. Compass missing, mirror of death
broken into windows cheering on chance
encounters with the playful world, he looks,
he touches, he glides the electric land.
D. R. James, retired from nearly 40 years of teaching college writing, literature, and peace studies, lives with his psychotherapist wife in the woods near Saugatuck, Michigan. His latest of ten collections is Mobius Trip (Dos Madres Press). D. R. James at ē·rā/tiō.