1.
Capture what’s needed, what ingredients you’ll want:

the whisper willow, the ugly bayonet, the atrocity hollow, the blank armor, the stirred charnelhouse floor,
the scent of dandelion leaves rubbed into your own prepubescent skin, the darkling charm of pockets,
the rejected lift in a ballet of sweet arms, the last time you saw home and called it home.

2.
Choose the tool:

the whip, the plow blade, the helicopter, the shotgun, the scalpel, the lion-skin shield, the sextant, the spoon.

3.
Describe the path:

the long, the hop, the stride, the stumble, the windblown, the straightedge, the safecrack, the stonecutter, the sprint,
the border flirt, the beach hike, the pilgrimage, the forced march, the leftover journey, the lost scramble, the armchair.

4.
With tool in hand or mouth,
with ingredients in bowl or pouch,
with path certainly not complete,
with detours assured,
with eyes squinting,
with feet blistered,
with car towed,
with bedtime iffy,
with funds humorous,
with credit stolen,
with distress signal singing in your left lung,
with glory in a hole,
with partner on the sly,

cover ground
until it falls away from you
and all you’ve collected is consumed
in the compost of the miles behind you,

each item having been bent crooked
then hidden from you:

inserted into crevices,
buried in mass graves,
handed off to momentary hobos,
sold for meals,
sent to family for safekeeping;

descriptions carved into stone
and marked for aging
until you are forgotten
and all you carried is all
that anyone recalls when they speak your name.