To trace the taboo labyrinth, sneak
past the frigid swells, between breakers,
make your way
up the pebbled strand, bare feet bleeding.
Enter the sinister path between upright stones.
Touch no rock but walk upright, toes pointed
inward, thoughts pointed outward;
take the route the rodents took,
the turning marked by no human feet.
When you have forgotten your body,
bruised and bloodied and chilled with subarctic air,
discover the maze’s center.
The forgetting will always find you there.
Draw into yourself the stones,
the sea,
the tracks of forgotten beasts,
the mystery of unknowing.
Then leave the labyrinth behind,
unaltered, untouched, unforgotten.