bark (poem)

bark

A New Science you had thought of all yourself

coopted by the culture, as though your careful memoir

unstocked by the reference libraries of most,

could be outrun by a browse at the salad bar of information

A short intro, or the first of a bulleted list

of Key Questions,

Could shove itself with a sweaty fling and break the tape

And now it’s you who are the copycat, the also ran

In this age, your chance to boast may be dislodged by a gust

A whump of fallen timber

A hiker’s toes entrapped, the follower not wreathed in victory

but dust

A billow that fills lungs, and filters heated news to the modern tick

Adaptation to adaptation’s map, warning you in peevish intonation

that in this bog unsurveyed pockets lurk

and there, alert on that slight inclination

feral deer flag each other from the rear

and break the silence with a huff of air

bark

The Travelers

(Stephanie Foster, 2026)