The Myth of Permanent Faults

Never underestimate either the strength or fragility 
of power—what ticks quietly all these years beneath 

the walls, one day also buckles from the load 
it's made to carry. Between circuits, a current 

falters. A bulb goes out, and quiet spreads through
a house in which all the machines have mysteriously

hummed themselves to sleep. Yet this is not 
the time for elegy or grieving. The sun burns

hotter than before, but roseate spoonbills 
and other birds still shelter in the dense sediment 

of mangroves; see, they haven't given up seeking 
cells of cool sustenance. They plug themselves with full

belief into a web that trembles from the energy of every 
creature's offering of their own thirst and desire.