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I wake and spend the last hours of darkness with no one

The water is gracious as taffeta folding out from you, streaming over. In sunlight it dazzles the skin, brilliantly blinds you for moments that last as long as breath. You know the dream of flying is nothing to this. You drift beneath the surface like reflected clouds in a quick wind. This is the life that skims the dark, trades the desire to stay down for the cool splash of voices at the pool's edge.

Light chooses white sails, the bellies of gulls.

She likes the comely shape of the copper beech and notes the wedge of sky that shows where the tree received stigmata. I like to watch her walk up the path because she is beautiful and sees beauty where I see sadness: in the retreating summer night, in the night of the pond's enormous, still eye, in the amphitheater of bullfrog and treefrog and peeper, in the silver steam coming off the water, in the arc of the diving body disappearing, in the splash of a creature nearing we name turtle or snake. The floating dock drifts with its jealous reflection appearing like a face. And I, who have no claim on this woman or this lake take the measure of the summer from the fireflies— luminous against the dark trees—and the slowly revolving dock I dream free from its moorings by morning.

I stood at the dangerous shore. Sleeves rolled up to my shoulders. My fringe lifted in the wind in a long salute and I pushed it back. Live your wish, Live your wish, said the sea. I wanted to be like the shells on the beach, rubbed smooth and cracked open. And I held my arms out, tipped my head back, pictured my protective symbols. I opened my eyes and saw the sign of the anchor burning. I had to go. I shouted some words but they were lost when the waves crashed. And ash rained from the sky. I was far out, in wet denim, and the shore was a jolt when I looked back.

Not quite at home in the world and turning toward the terminus

And what did you see, sequoia-quiet, looking out at black night. No islands, no kings or corridors of fury. But the districts where we were born, a few icy stars, the moon’s beaming chalk thirst. Above the painted desert, the air rustles at your wrists, pulls away from the long industry on land, up into those far lights. A vast ordinance, unspoken, with no need to be spoken. Those who did not have to die. Yourself, and all you loved.

Folks would talk about it, and even after I lived in that mountain town months, a year, even after getting close with the girl from the pharmacy, guys from the woods, I did not know.

Boat of night, I ease into your black waters. No turn of circles in the oarlocks— tonight I’ll follow. The oracle never looks like an oracle, it’s the cockleshell that comes after the tide. How many times have I looked up at a sky like this— all chipped teacup and veil and felt the losses as nearly manageable, pebbles I could arrange to balance a curved spine. Rocking I enter. Rocking I leave.

You turn towards meteor showers in August, wishing yourself like that: bright and burning wholly out. When feeling finally comes it is that falling, matter breaking away from air, the sound of crickets moving through the grass like fire— and the strangely twisted metal in the field that a child finds: residue, crown. Then there’s the story of the Chinese sage, in anger and despair, who cut his body away in pieces, flung them into the lake. Each one, becoming finned and whole, swims off.

Whatsoever comes to the screen, firefly or moth, I lean back in the wicker chair, the porch my fragile skin between me and the gorgeous open maw, the sucking swallowing world.

I see finches dip along the feeders or at basin’s edge. They know

There are thoughts that come to the door screen summer nights, lured by a light kept on by some childhood fear. They bump up against it, or cling.

The gold of evening is closing, drawing in, tightening. The light is losing. It is a little frightening how fast August goes. Others have noticed this. The cat on his concealed switchblade toes comes by, and what he says is silent, but enlightening.

I’d lean close, my ear to her whisper and roar, her tongue scattered with stars.

It was the summer the sand came, the summer it filled the house, blew in through the cracks, between my teeth. The summer the cicadas changed their tune: two notes to one. Drone and thrum. The birds undid their bodies like bombs. Storms came every day. Sand between the sheets, the towels, in the curve of my back, clogging the drain. Something died and I killed it. It tried to kill me. Sand filled my mouth. I choked on the gold. The air furred as black bear, and the baby held his breath. I held him to my chest. Here is the choice: leap or drown. Some girls can't fly. The Lake swallowed up the Pleiades. Against the shore, waves broke their small backs.

I dove under water Under salt water Ocean water While a party continued upon the surface It was night Lights danced upon the waves Diving to the bottom at night "Some are born to endless night"