Into Strange Thousands

How weird to start with a brick,
To intend to make a brick,
Work as a brick-layer, when

The work feels more like cement,
And not at all like a brick.
Every time you start a line,

You’re pouring the admixture
Meant to go between the bricks
To hold the bricks together—

But where did the bricks come from?
Who piled the loose collection
Of items, quanta—not waves—

With which you’ve conjured a home,
A palace, a great big heap
Of many-roomed residence,

An edifice of maybe
Something that could be called
Home, if you knew why cement

Could be hallucinated,
In its process of making,
Into strange thousands of poems?