The rhetor writes, “Linked phrases run through the a’s, b’s, c’s so on, but a-phrases, again, often point to the composition (the kind I am).

B-wise, my creativity
is not wasted in remorse.
What I owe: I know
almost and almost lost,
unfinished, in everything. For the c’s
I moved along a scratchy plain
of dandelions, peony, clover:
checked for snags of fern, fir,
and the only woman nodded: Oh yes —
It’s always your newness:

and I see your form
as I fill in the questionnaire
putting your back into it.”