Moving Sideways

 

a crab waits until I touch it before it scuttles back into the sea                                             

blasted little four inch scavenger-predator

how do you fit in your tiny excavated hole-in-one?

do you wear a lobster bib at dinnertime?

if I slept, lulled by rhythmic water

would you pinch my extremities?

were you excommunicated from

The Fraternal Order of Crustaceans?

[RK, 10/5/2020]

 

 

Scratching the Surface

 

straitlaced orange girders rise above

mid-Southern Pacific waves

something from M.C. Escher’s sketchbook

the attached way station devoid now

of ships and passengers these many years

perforated metal stair treads lead down

the water opaque at full fathom five

unplumbed depths just below consciousness

a rope uncoils and the sounding lead

drops to the seabed

we cavort like dolphins born tail first

pushed to the surface for the first breath

 

it is always mid-day, yet time passes

removed from the water

you take rest on the stairway

hair and skin salted

drip-dry moments in the endless day

when the hands of the way station wall clock

give up, halt, wait patiently

you flick hopeful eyes at the circular horizon

awaiting a ship you have seen in your own dreams

although you cannot describe it

[RK, 10/5/2020]