PALEOLITHIC REMAINS

I.

Those comb-pattern pottery people

                   (my) forebears—a clan people scrape, chop, make tools

Each animal and plant, descent of the sun

       Rain fall, a letter of the alphabet

The pitch and whistle of this thrown bone

Find shelter, a cave to mock
                             the room inside your mother

                                             My ear tuned to radiocarbon

Or did they use plain pottery, unmarked
                                                                                                                  blameless, virgin

       Follow the curve of the jaw bone
                                      under glass now

                                      under tissue strips & red muscle

My map says Kyŏnggi—Romanized
                                      for everyone

To see mammal bone, time-clean, sanded like a campfire pan

                    The wrist writes its dictionary of motions

Come here, child, dog
                           palm down, palm up

       Weather, shy around the stray

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