Specimens missing, notes of apology,
the vandalized seismograph, derelict,
in one corner rests, its leads still attached
to an obelisk of granite, to a monitor
(off now) that ought to be showing
the tremors below, too faint for our
soles to pick up from the sidewalk, the street,
the path through the garden,
packed under wanderers and last autumn’s leaves.
But you and I scavenge through Herkimer diamonds,
gastroliths, chrysotile, dendritic gypsum,
and back by the entrance we pick out from
the tumble and sheet three polished stones,
two mica rings. On the drive home we will stand
by the side of the parkway, stare from the split-rail
at Looking Glass Rock, and without any signal stretch
back to the sign, grasping for the word “pluton”
in what we remember
from the little museum under Pack Square.
