Bought it in the 60’s for fifty cents at a flea market stall from
a beaded pseudo-hippie love goddess and dug it up by chance
under old shoes on the floor at the back of a storage closet ––
its cinnabar lacquer finish smooth to the touch, black reptilian monsters
spitting ornate flames, toxic scent still rising out of interior dank
Rummaging through the odds and ends of a miscellaneous life
I wonder at so much gone missing: souvenirs of travels I thought
I tossed inside, scribbled notes from lovers, photos of my children,
adventures I planned in my youth, the magic I expected
from the karma of the artist who gave spirits to the creatures
writhing across the surface of the wood in make-believe mist
What’s left is my draft card, a tangle of funky chains once thought
cool for a man to hang around his neck, a silver cigarette lighter
inscribed with, “Those who forget history are bound to relive it,”
given to me on Christmas Day in a jungle hooch in Cambodia
by a soldier sent home early for going crazy, a gold tie pin
from years in the troughs of Wall Street dodging the feral 500’s,
Eugene McCarthy campaign button, carved ivory Buddha
and a peace dove ring that no longer fits
Life has been called a journey but journey is too grand a word
for such a small collection of people, objects, moments, a life
with too little time to gather those things I wanted for myself,
and only a few afternoons left to lift the lid and inhale the souls
of distant dragons