Self Portrait of a Snare Inside a Snare Drum

Like the Roman General Regulus nailed shut
into a barrel with a tendency to rust
as it bobs like an Apollonian vase
over the broken pier glass of some falls,

observe how often you duck and (yes) flinch
inside the rattle
in which like a house finch
you mostly yawn and bleed for lack

of any breathing space.

Why it is, as your little yellow submarine
strolls past the sawdust
of yet another blue-ridge farm,

you pine for one last picnic beneath the bust
and (mot juste) all-embracing pall
of the Little Red Light House

that keeps the faint aura of hope from being completely doused

by the rapid at hand and those still looming in the cards
as you fail to nail down how exactly the snare
in a snare drum first produces a thump
before the pale jar

that, beneath the river roar,
ultimately sounds for
the thud of breaking apart.