Tune-lover, beachcomber sculpting
seashells from stones to listen for ripples (nothing

loaded but time) and I have written– haven’t I–
distance into oblivion (that tidal bass a metaphor,
its vastness deepening) & am I not a shell of was

once, was gripping to any mast to lose
the sea, change quivering– I swear– every molecule
of my being, I must (from the must) of any old

ceiling, the dust it lends to fading carpets,
the ones we walked and walk on today

(originally published in The Broken City, Summer 2021)