I
There are those which are alike in spite of appearance

       which share a secret affinity, an invisible harmony.
But then there are those which are neither alike nor unalike

that you place in separate boxes

                                                   as the wind picks out

              a shape on the outer wall

sight so weary it can’t hold anything else.

You think on the essence of a leopard

always already a panther, always happy to field questions

from the audience. What do names correspond to

                                                                                           anyway?

Might as well call it what you like, lure the conversation

back to objects and their intentions.
                             To contain the world (they

                             say) draw a line around it.
But then, the chef holds a different knife to the hunter

the video a different shape to the eye––at that hour

        from that distance

you can’t tell a blur from a likeness. It’s about prospect

and aspect, you know, a capacity for basking, that

        resonance at the back of the mind. After all

Der panther is also sometimes a jaguar

                                    sometimes a cougar

                       even a mountain lion.
                    II
To speak.
              You followed language into the bush.
To say it in three words.
              Pursued its scent.
To listen.
No one thought ‘the landscape is a system’ or ‘a geometry

of soil and sky’ or ‘a tree is already a symbol of itself’.
              You felt its claw marks on the trunk.
No one said ‘our idea of the undergrowth

precedes our apprehension of it’

or ‘we don’t belong here’

or ‘it can climb, can’t it’.
                                            The leaves

              folded back on themselves.
No one thought ‘the rule for a circle

holds for all circles’ or ‘the clearing

lets in more light as it expands’ or

‘any perimeter can be stalked’.
To call up an image.
To consider it from all angles.
No one said ‘depict the canopy as a diagram’

or ‘understand it from the inside’ or

‘interpretation is always partial’.
To perceive.
              You don’t know what words

                                                                 were chosen

                                                           in the end.
To recognise.
              Which of them were buried here.
To elaborate.
              Not words, but teeth.
No one said ‘the ground is a plane of expression’ or

‘scatter the seeds’ or ‘let the architecture emerge’.
              You made a mild intervention.
No one thought ‘we need a category

for both the things that are, that they are,

and those that are not, that they are not’.
To pause and reflect.
              Now names lie concealed in each bough and branch

                                                                        here and here and here.
To articulate.
No one thought ‘names are a vital part of what they define’

or ‘to name is to classify’ or ‘have dominion over things’.
No one said ‘we can’t think of a line

without tracing it in our minds’ or ‘a description

is a movement’ or ‘see where it leads’.
              Now you’ve forgotten how to look past

              the surface of things.
To be contained by the world.
              Lost your bearings.
To stand outside it.
To reconcile time and place.
No one thought ‘a path exemplifies the forest’ or

‘talking about things brings them into being’

or ‘nothing is self-contained’.
              You retrace your steps.
No one said ‘all categories are provisional’ or

‘any two objects placed in a space will form

a connection’.
No one said ‘the banks emerge only

as the bridge crosses the stream’.
To manifest.
No one thought ‘we should learn about the pines

from the pine’ or ‘all stones have weight’.
To leave from.
No one said ‘hold your finger to the neck

of the woods’ or ‘take its pulse’ or ‘feel the

tightened silence through the shoulders’.
To come into being.
              You followed language into the bush.
To wait.
              Took satisfaction from small insights.
To be in attendance.
              Knowing that a more comprehensive

                          understanding was impossible.
No one reflected ‘an image plunges into the heart

and is gone’ or ‘the grove in our minds is laid waste’.
To revise.
To count the vertebrae.
              Whoever said you can only walk halfway

              into a forest has never been lost.