So first you saw this: Pitch, gumming a two

party wagon wheel—mule. Before the cart

before the cartwheeling wheel. After, mule

suspended in action pose across Sports

Illustrated. See the mule saunter forth:

low smoke oxbowing a manicured maze

of hedges. When a man is made of ghosts

& soot, broken, stuck in a time loop, he’s

a fixed interloper in at least one

dimension. When a man is a concept

made of ash & scholarship, ivory

theses, factually sound arguments

it’s easy to forget he’s been granted

a key that sticks. If/then/when he is ground.