Travelling standing still, I took
Years to do a piece
Of one Pacific Island. Now
Everywhere I look—
As if I stood on top the Pole
And saw surrounding how 
The horizon was travelling
While I was standing still—
The world goes round and round and I 
Am pure content to be
Its tiny axis toward a sky
That points and centers, spinning by,
In an earth that is, with me,
From root’s depth, into tree,
By tiny atoms, back and forth,
Shaken, a round trip out of earth,
To earth’s depth as before.
I could not travel more.

One circle out of earth and back
Takes seventy years at least;
The other goes with mental speed
Around to the level east.
The atom of my mind can look
While it is being taken
Upon an arc the plumed trees look,
Shaken and unshaken.
So the two circles. Momentary
The horizontal one.
And the tall circle, too, the airy
Flight to the flowing sun,
Converge on this, my standing still,
My travelling through space,
Going somewhere, until
I arrive at no place. 

Black clouds, lion-shaped,
White clouds, elephant-like, yonder. 
Crash! Crash! Thundering as if breaking the sky into two pieces. 
Slash! Slash! Lightening to cut the mountain top off. 
The Storm extends from sky to earth,
Youth’s vigour, love’s passion, beauty’s rapture.
Then Pearl-drops of hail – hundreds of jade-pieces,
Tok-tok-tok-tok-tok, monastery jingling bell.
Again soft slender rain.
Sh! Sh! Sh! Sh! Sh! whispering to the lover’s ear alone: 
“I love you, I love you, ever, ever, ever, ever.”

I am a child  
of wonder again and 
rain tells me to watch 
for snails and slugs. 

I gather dirt, sand, and sticks 
for the terrarium 
where I make a safe home 
away from footsteps, fast cars, and ditch water.

I don’t want them to die  
so I make them  
a space for living. 

I ask my ma to buy lettuce 
because in the book I got from the library 
I learned they will eat lettuce.

I am  
greedy to learn  
what keeps everything alive.

Their spiral shapes leave shiny trails behind. 
I imagine I am a snail leaving  
magic everywhere I go.