The Hall of Curious Faces
After Rocks From the Japanese Museum of Rocks

What tumble river carved me,
eye bags that list toward sadness
when sunshine dries my tears

What rolling down a hill
on the sharp crest of yesterday
brought my nose into focus

What upside down slumber in mud
sealed my lips against the days
that are sure to come in moments

No ears? And the hair of moss
coming on again, shriveled
this summer, now the rain.

You found me again, sedate
in the river of these days.
Do not shelve me.

Leave me here to look.

—Tricia Knoll

Tricia Knoll is a Vermont poet with a big enough "thing" for rocks that she raised a daughter who became a geologist. Knoll's work appears widely in journals and anthologies.