Verse: Prospect

In another time
we might have been
explorers
like Vespucci
or Denys

I often wonder
what is there
left to discover
we found this
place not with
compass or sextant
but with Google Maps
everything has
been documented
and surveyed
so it seems
but not everything
has been revealed

my younger brothers
the chef
the forestry consultant
and me
ten years
and a day
separate we three
and several thousand
miles now as well
how odd
when there are
so many forests
so close at hand

and occasions
like these
are increasingly rare
like grass that
comes up through
the cracks on
the sidewalk
like a comet
illuminating
an onyx sky
like insight

we will be talking
about that weekend
for years to come
the boat we rented
the island
we found
the bald rocks
where settlers dried fish
the dolphins and
the whale we saw
the nights we slept
with the dog
on the soft beach
beneath the stars
a lambent canopy
how fluid
and connected
it all seemed
in the moment
how fragmentary
it seems
in retrospect
and distant
somewhat like photos that
belong to someone else
but not someone else
just a different time

that weekend
will become legendary
in the retelling
more colorful
more profound
in years to come
that's how it is
with memory
you embellish

and if there is
no sea nor land
left to discover
in any remote corner
of this finite earth
there is the discovery
that occurs
in those increasingly
rare encounters
between the memories
when we are brothers
in more than name
once more