Spring Runoff

Every hour is overflowing with the next thing
until tears and unfinished projects wash
down the staircases
like spring runoff, twiggy, muddy,
smelling of duck shit. Every child

a want in motion, in verbosity, in mouth
and stomach and, then by, the product
procured. Every letter left words unsaid,
thought unfinished, meanings distorted
as patterns on calico cats. Every

path worn in reasoning the will against
what has been done before, as all history conspires
to keep stagnant
the mire of a fresh and minty idea, that one being
the one to floss teeth to, to count profits,
to temper words in some facsimile
of meaning
of reckoning
of knowing and realizations

that this one thing

could have made every other next thing
worth the while.