Laurentian River Cadence
Nicholas Power
no longer caught in the four-cornered logic of cities
we listen for the magnetic declination of meridians
we walk indeterminate spaces not shown on maps
present to absence, affirming an excluded middle
we are called out into the void between identities
where we try to decipher the saying amid the unsaid
realizing possibilities by stating the impossible
summer lightning is momentary, our lightening is epiphanous
in this coincidence of opposites, a rare cadence finds us
the mystery of its source obscured in the heat of discovery
a tune flowing in search of its own unattainable end*
an imperceptible melody playing perpetually but rarely heard
the entirely natural flow of an ancient subterranean river
singing an old song new to us in continual chant
the infinite inaudible beneath the continually perceived
the spontaneous ecstasy of a harmony without intention
*Abraham Joshua Heschel
Declination: the angle formed between a magnetic needle and the geographical meridian; angular distance north or south from the celestial equator measured along a great circle passing through the celestial poles
Nicholas Power 