I no longer believe in the idea of magic,
Christs, the self, metal buddhas, bibles.
A horse is only the space his horseness requires.
If I pissed in the woods would a tree see my ear
Fall off and would the ear return to the body
On the morning of the third day? Do bo trees
Ever remember the buddhas who’ve slept beneath them?
I admit that yesterday I build an exploratory altar.
Who can squash his delight in incomprehension?
So on a piece of old newspaper I put an earth worm
On a maple leaf, the remains of a bluebird after
The cat was finished – head and feet, some dog hair,
Shavings from when we trimmed the horses’ hooves,
A snakeskin, a stalk of ragweed, a gourd,
A lemon, a cedar splinter, a nonsymbolic doorknob,
A bumblebee with his juice sucked out by a wasp.
Before this altar I invented a doggerel* mantra
It is this it is this it is this

Jim Harrison from The Shape of the Journey: New and Collected Poems
Copyrighted material; for educational/therapeutic purposes only.

*Doggerel: comic verse composed in irregular rhythm; verse or words that are badly written or expressed.