creatures caught
in the heat of mating/
body parts
of personal history/
memory’s tenuous grip/
sudden dip
of yesterday’s gulls
at the rocky shore/
the Bay of Fundy’s
lonely sweep/
tropical birds of Florida
rock cliffs of Arizona/
the heat of today past
a shallow light is cast/
the whole story is not whole—
parts mirror a larger tale
as valves my heart’s health/
bold claims of Whitman’s America
Dickinson’s not wanting
to impose/
the shell’s swirl
mimicked in nature
in our patterns/
flashes of flower
of flood/
soft belly under a wave
veins of a last leaf/
life as derivative
as new
Photo by Martin Rancourt on Unsplash
