The Kingfisher

The great ocean

It's a quiet morning and the day is unwritten,
The dawn struggles in bedsheets of cloud.
My limbs, in sympathy, are at a standstill.

Here I am at my desk,
these keys too loud for the thin light from outside,
The wind and rain fighting over the few scraps of attention
I can bring to bear.
There the great ocean looms through the glass,
There it swallows fear and hope in the same tide.

Among the rocks, caught like skeins of seaweed
are small threads of discord,
Holes torn in geologic time.

I can’t quite ignore them but neither can I find, what?
Solace? Inspiration? An echo of a childhood?

Why have you abandoned me to these modern miracles?
When if given the choice I would drown
Or at least slip into some sort of oblivious dream,
Leaving the tyranny of my screen to the gulls.

Their sharp cry is a call to abandon this folly,
Or at least to dress, breakfast, and join the thick press of demands ahead.

I tap on instead.