intention

intention

here where rusted three-inch nails

pull out of burrows in the treated timbers

someone's fence has fallen

making a show of possession

I could step easily through

the rancher's effort to draw a line

this far out over his mountain through

his birches and pine

even spanning the marshy stream

tells me he intends to repair this gap

the long fence, vertical upon the hillside

dissolves into quiet trunks further up

I've only made a slight intrusion

the birds don't mind, I think nor the

squirrels, the pines

even the tightly crowded ironwoods

have only slowed my pace

but something in stumbling upon intention

looped so far out around the neck

of a mountain

makes even a ragged barrier

seem consequential