As If to Demonstrate an Eclipse

I pick an orange from a wicker basketand place it on the tableto represent the sun.Then down at the other enda blue and white marblebecomes the earthand nearby I lay the little moon of an aspirin. I get a glass from a cabinet,open a bottle of wine,then I sit in a ladder-back chair,a benevolent god presidingover a miniature creation myth, and I begin to singa homemade canticle of thanksfor this perfect little arrangement,for not making the earth too hot or coldnot making it spin too fast or slow so that the grove of orange treesand the owl become possible,not to mention the rolling wave,the play of clouds, geese in flight,and the Z of lightning on a dark lake. Then I fill my glass againand give thanks for the trout,the oak, and the yellow feather, singing the room full of shadows,as sun and earth and mooncircle one another in their impeccable orbitsand I get more and more cockeyed with gratitude.

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