Thirty-Six Poets

after Sokai Hoitsu

Some are drunk. Some are mumbling.
Many are solitary, each in his way fixed.
They are all happy over their very good number,
an easy square; its root, six,
itself a lovely number, exponential chrysalis.
And if, in the array of patterns
taken from nature — clouds, spider webs, starfish,
we might yet find a true square
not one of these thirty-six, not the one
whose square is on his sleeve or heart, cares.