Mandelbrot and Others

With light poise
They stood amid the shattered grids
And drew a core of hard and real
From sensitive chaos: rock and seacoast,
Snowflake, fault, and folding air.

We, too, know
Life abounds at boundaries,
The actual and empty edge
Where turbulence and order grow,
Held and holding, as I hold you.

I grow firm
Where you fold into me, your mouth
A sea of meaning, full of force
And form, the shock and joy of flesh.
Your name is alive in my throat.