Words Are the Sum

1

As so-called quarks, so atoms before and through

And after molecules, which too

Constitute us awhile, pluming

Through our slowly changing shapes

Like beachscapes

Through a duneless sandglass, say

(I said, once) — all these

So utterly forgetful, wiped clean

As numbers with each new use, lint-free.

How not so words, which pass our minds

And mouths and ears from hind-

Most elsewhere, on their way to elsewhere — why

So?

Words are the sum of their histories: rose

And roke and no and blanketing snow.

2

So much less LEGO-like, click-

Click together than like slick

Tentacular

Colonial hydrozoans tossed

Together in the copper pots

Of   predication — all cross-

Shock and shimmery tangle —

How can

Anyone calculate semantic

Sets so dervishly complex?

How can we not expect not less but hellish

Much more than to mean what we say? Then guess:

How can we better but

Hope to become in sum what

We say when we say again love?