The Bucket

the bucket is full
its contents threaten
to overflow
with every step
I have to measure my pace
walk very slowly
it takes hours to
move but an inch

the bucket is heavy
its bottom deep
no point in looking within
its depths are unknowable
the end of its insides
impossible to fathom

the bucket is greedy
never satisfied
its belly swells up
enough to eat
every painful drop
but it has no guts
it cannot digest
any of it

walking along the path
my lopsided yoke and
huge hungry bucket
whose wide open mouth could
swallow the heavens
are pulling down, down
on my right shoulder
listing to the side
like a ship half-sunk
while the captain stands
slant-legged
on the bow
mulling over the specifics
of his duty

a passerby stops to ask me,
What's with you, why
do you lean so far over,
why can't you stop
almost falling down?

and I dip my hands
in the bucket
try to draw out
one single silver droplet
that will explain it
try to choose one molecule
from the ocean
that I'm hauling uphill
but
the more I try to
tease out
one lone care
to be my example
the wider the gaps
of my fingers become
until I am holding nothing
but the span of a canyon
that cannot be bridged

and everything I meant to say
slips back into the bucket
all of a piece
and hoisting the slanted yoke
back up
my shoulder resuming its
shameful ache
I tell them,
Do you see? I
no longer know