It derives from the Greek for "little key,"
suggesting that maps have clits, and perhaps
vice versa, which sheds new light on the men
who'd rather stay lost than ask for directions,
who stick with the roads they know, telling
each other that things are the same old same old.
It provides no answers for tests,
because real questions are the only hot ones;
it opens trap doors under Locke and his tabula
rasa, which means "eraserhead,"
as he couldn't have known. Imagine him now:
published in Mind just a year after earning
his driver's license, fearlessly seeking
the nature of truth but never directions.
Michael Jones' poetry has appeared in journals such as Beloit Poetry Journal and Tar River Poetry; also in a chapbook, Moved (Kattywompus, 2016). He has taught in city schools since 1990.