As at the Far Edge of Circling

As at the far edge of circling the country,
facing suddenly the other ocean,
the boundless edge of what I had wanted
to know, I stepped
into my answers’ shadow ocean,

the tightening curl of the corners
of outdated old paperbacks, breakers,
a crumble surf of tiny dry triangles around
my ankles sinking in my stand

taken that the horizon written
by the spin of my compass is that this is
is not enough a point to turn around on,

is like a skin that falls short of edge
as a rug, that covers a no longer
natural spot, no longer existent
to live on from, the map of my person
come to the end of, but not done.

That country crossed was what I could imagine,
and that little spit of answer is the shadow—
not the ocean which casts it— that I step next
into to be cleansed of question.

But not of seeking …it as
if simplified for the seeking,
come to its end at this body.

--Ed Roberson