Happiness. In french, bonheur: the good hour, as opposed to unhappiness, malheur: the bad or evil hour. Where were you standing when the hours were sorted? There aren’t enough good hours, and we all must settle for a greater or lesser lot of the bad ones. There may be an hour within which you exchange wedding vows, an hour within which you choose a vocation, uproot yourself, or speak truth upon uncertain ground to an unreliable listener. There is the hour of your birth and above all the hour of your death. You may hope for these to be among the good hours, but nothing is guaranteed.

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Down in the shallow trenches of my erudition

palms upon the stones I searched-

for what?

For shelter, for a route out, beyond, no,

Yes-

deeper within.

With humble inherited pick

and shovel. With all but my grip

on the tools unsure-

I dug at a pulse I sensed

in the center

of the Earth

where the roots

of continents converge.

 

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