The List

Was that just thunder or someone dragging their chair
over the boards of the narrow porch at Nanbu's courtyard
now there's nothing to say there it goes again
right to the top of the list the one I haven't made yet
the one I will leave on the kitchen counter or right here
where it hasn't happened yet lists don't happen I know
they're written scribed chicken-scratched here's
the ox-heads making their As the double-yokes
their busy Bs the sickle C ready to cut through
Mediterranean waves now nothing just groceries
or things that happened last week so we can say
we're alive the other day I made one up for creatures
starting with wait a minute while I look for it
goats and ending with mongoose don't worry
there were birds in there myna uncelebrated
but everpresent and melodious laughing thrush
hardly present but gloriously celebrated and
three kinds of beetle in case you're wondering
the sort of list where one word say centipede
can conjure up at least five or more stories
like the time in bed when it felt like
all the hair got torn off one arm see that's
wriggling and stinging its way behind
that one word ono too three letters
two of them the same eyeballs popping
when right there by the harbor up it flashed
from the depths a ferocious slippery rainbow