A Note From the Syllabus (For My Daughter, Asante)

I have seen the atom's spiral spin The nucleus designing Golgi and gelatin Heard stars singing beyond the milky way Above trees suckling the **** of clay And sometimes in silence I sit Where the water laps my dangling feet Watch sprays nibble the rocks' hard wit And castle the sands of their defeat Take time to taste your songs, my child Linger their scent against your teeth, guile Is in a world we take for granted In a universe round all things are slanted. And when you love, do not know What tomorrow shall be again You are only the glow Of surges suckled by the eternal rain. Take time to be a poet's eye And hear the wounded waters cry Take time to be a child's first thought And see the moth in the flame's web caught Life has a long syllabus to learn I am more uncertain Sages too drown in all they discern Just a note at the parting of the curtain.