Amy MacLennan

Spelunking

With a craving, deep,
we seek forsaken space,
unmapped caves
where headlamps shock
the walls, our voices first
to smack rock. Bits
of our skin, twists of hair
drift down to the dirt,
and we step hard,
hoping, blood slowing,
until the cavern
ends with figures
scratched across stone
or pottery shattered
on a shelf.
We must
back out, search again
for the grotto, subterrane,
just one untouched chamber.
If the passage is pure,
we might find a niche,
a crack in the muddied world,
through which we could slip
in jasmine air to find
a garden, to leave our prints
in forgotten grass.