Early accounts of cedars
lining lower reaches

of the Cedar estimate circumferences
of one hundred feet. The wood

is gone; the blade misremembered.
Who swings the axe to crack

wafers of such godly size?
First blows hew deep

fissures of erasure while the last
have yet to land.

Beg a timepiece
to pin down an analog

for the word early. Forgiveness
is to decision as a living tree is to decision

as mortality is to a good watch:
heavy in pocket, solid in hand.