Sure lines

With these borrowed

hands, I preen and I prod, poking

this vessel,

taking exploratory measure-

ments

only I can comfortably make.

They do not fit-

together.

Fingers, tendrils, palms, 

veins; grasping, touching

or holding.

Yet I know I need them

as is.

This is why I collect the seashells

at the shoreline,

we may never fit in

as beautifully

as when we are ejected

from the abyss 

we thought we knew

as Home. 

Painting by John Morgan (1823-1885), 'A girl with a seashell' in Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

Beading

The wind breaks
promises

and I storm off
in bitter retreat,

sucking out the sour
isolation...

And the shoreline
waves
recognizing its relationship
with the timeline

inevitable as the tides turn
over

Revealing
what has been there
and who is dancing at the edge
unafraid
of falling in

for a pearl.

It comes in waves;
pain, sleep, sound, this feeling
the crashing is closer

becoming brackish
tumultuous and turbid for a trace
of gold
in every full glass
we see through

The warm breeze
blew away
our differences.

How easily mist
the rising and falling
of all things

may be made
more
than solid or whole,
as in part

of us
is always drowning

and becoming
one and the same.


Painting by Władysław Wankie (1860-1925) 'Fisherwomen on the shore', [Public domain].