If I were paddling a green canoe
traveling a rate of x miles
per hour and you were
in a blue canoe traveling
at a rate of y miles per hour,
and the rate of the stream
was a given, which already
we know is a lie,
how hard would I need
to paddle, in which force equals
d, to make the canoe
a field of rye where we are
wading through golden
waist-high grass
and no longer traveling
in separate canoes?
And let’s say the field
had a breeze travelling
from the west at p miles per hour,
then if I tossed you a dream
and you were standing
due east of me, how long
would it take the dream
to reach you? I know,
not enough facts, and
I have included too many
irrelevant details,
though we both know they’re essential.
This is why math is only good
for certain kinds of problems.
Of course the field was golden.
Though I wouldn’t mind
if it were green, if there
were blue flax flowers
bobbing in the breeze,
a whole river of them
nodding at us as if to say,
yes, that’s right, it doesn’t
make sense, that’s okay,
that’s okay.