William Harmon

Pricksongwort

for Robert Morgan

Such mica pods looking

like a handful of

lunar halfnotes looking back at us

beholders,

given as tho’ a bestowal

from scattering gods, define one plant

bearing

the usual dozen names, one thereof a summa

with animal elements, and vegetable,

and musico-

mathematical,

coefficients melodic enough to rate

the name money plant,

as noble a denomination

as mint and

Mint Museum (that

in Charlotte where they made coins

from ore mined in Cabarrus

County, first

found in 1799). Songbirds on parallel

wires can look

like song, as these

alien toenails

could be taken for sails on isinglass lakes

or scales or scales of scales.