Song of Weights and Measurements

For there is a dram.

For there is a farthing.

A bushel for your thoughts.

A hand for your withered heights.

For I have jouled along attempting

to quire and wisp.

For I have sized up a mountain’s meters,

come down jiffy by shake to the tune

of leagues and stones.

For once I was your peckish darling.

For once there was the measure

of what an ox could plow

in a single morning.

For once the fother, the reed, the palm.

For one megalithic year I fixed my gaze

on the smiling meniscus, against the gray wall

of graduated cylinder.

For once I measured ten out of ten

on the scale of pain.

For I knew that soon I’d kiss good-bye

the bovate, the hide and hundredweight.

For in each pinch of salt, a whisper of doubt,

for in each medieval moment, emotion,

like an unruly cough syrup bottle,

uncapped. For though I dutifully swallowed

my banana doses, ascended, from welcome

to lanthorn, three barleycorns at a time,

I could not tackle the trudging, trenchant cart.

For now I am forty rods from your chain and bolt.

For now I am my six-sacked self.