CARP Poem by Ruth Lasters

The fact that no one ever saw the complete formation of an ice sheet,
really every second of how a pond congeals into

walkability. Of course there is no complete witness to this, not now
and not in the past. That sure point of contact with

people from earlier times suddenly brings them close, as if they are
looking at me through the murky surface of ice. Especially in the middle

near the frozen carp in the hole like a gap in time, through which they
seem to signal the consolation that now of all times there

are about as many of them missing, on the other side as we
have brain cells, as if in the head

of all who have been here
there is the wildest scintillation.