the fossil record

 

Third-grade geography as a kid in Ohio,
and for no reason that I could explain,

I was drawn to the six smaller states
at the northeast corner of our U.S. map:

a lapdog in profile, patiently waiting,
or a young boy wearing a woolen cap.

Far north, and comfortably marginal—
even then I sensed that I’d be better off

living many miles away from home.
Our textbook’s close-up photographs

intrigued me even more.  White churches
tucked in steep valleys of multi-hued trees.

Covered wooden bridges as red as barns,
stretched across snow-lined blue brooks.

Mist suspended above bright green hills
that weren’t Ohio’s hills.  Eight years old

and already I wanted to be there, I who’d
been only to Florida for family vacations

on Thanksgiving and midsummer breaks.
But I wasn’t Theseus then, and I had no

spool of thread to lead me out of anywhere.
Halfway through my life now, I wind here

in the dark through looping concentric rings,
just enough of a path from each to each,

spiraling gently closer to the labyrinth’s
hidden center, through densities of trees

set deep in a mountainside forest.  I’ve heard
I’ll find a makeshift altar at my destination,

where others who came before me left behind
their artifacts:  trinkets, gold bands, amulets,

amphorae filled with brightly colored stones.