“But We Should Take No Souvenirs”
“If thou couldst empty all thyself of self,
Like to a shell disinhabited,
Then might He find thee on the Ocean shelf…”
—T.E. Brown, “Indwelling”
I want someone to find me
isn’t this a dumb fantasy
and pulling my rough edges
out of the sand
hurriedly
as if worried for the tide and gulls
worried someone else will first
worried I am lonely for touch
empty and sand-covered though I am
I want someone to pick me up
and hold me in the warm spoon of the palm
brush me off and look at the brushstrokes
of the canyons and ridges rippling out
from my opened spine
running kind fingers up and down it
thinking not
where is the other half
what lived here once
should I throw it back where it came from
but ah, this is mine
this is complete
this is one to keep
