On the Impossibility of Owning Lake Michigan • Animal

in the beginning there were no lines no markers of where & what belong to whom
or whyor in the beginning the sky ripped its mouths   open so wide   &    out
poured a bloodorange yawn :: everything underneath transforms into mere element
consider the largest lake located entirely within a single country, boundlessness bent to the
whims of fermented ego. to possess infinity one must first find where it fractures thenbreak
in the beginning a line is only ever drawn to light the path i take to find you—the sole line that
forms    an arm extending out towards another bodypulling them in   in   inan invitation
inwards always. for months i am taught that one of the central elements of property law is the
right to exclude & isn’t that laughable? for me to define what is mine in terms of what isn’t
yours? for me to own the closest river & air circling above land surveyed in my surname? for the
land to belong to me & me alone because of whose name i inherit? for the right to water
to link arms& run   with the land   likea barnacle anchored headfirst to the   hull   of a
sinking ship:   capillaries   crack   open   to colonize. isn’t that American? to believe in clutching
a collection of atoms so close to our chests that our hearts forget to beat in anyone else’s
direction but our own? to obsess over borders?

to make language of
outer limits: invent ends
to all beginnings