water

“It is well to have some water in your neighborhood, to give  buoyancy to and to float the earth"

      Henry David Thoreau

it was my dream to start with

I see swells

see almost silent breaths upward facing mouths

all was water and no one knew what was a shore

so content was the water in smothering earth that not even the rocks had eyes

and I, (in my dream) dangling like a helicopter with nowhere to land

arms like wings of a white bird

nesting in salted dark swells

legs glued like a mermaid and

finally hair like someone who was drowned

I would give my eyes to the rocks, I said (in my dream), but all the priests said no

each rock said yes, though, (in my dream) even knowing that soon and forever even the highest desert would lose its buoyancy

Nov 22/11