MESSAGE IN A BOTTLE

Photo by Artiom Vallat on Unsplash

Curlews cry, an Aegean sky: a boat
lifts and falls. The heat of noon, a lethargic
gloom, she’s tracked with light this star-struck night.

Moon-shadows cast, it’s cool at last, this sweep
and swell, this road to hell. The ship’s becalmed
with false alarms, this attic night of bone-white light:
no palimpsest, no Grecian zest.

A Sapphic wind balloons the moon, fans the fog’s
penumbra, spreads this shadowy gloom. The ship’s horn
sounds, these hung penumbras,
this
scattered light.

This haven isle, this Sapphic home,
these cliffs, these stories, this alone; this fog-horn
fright, these brittle bones, this scattered light,

This all alone.