on this island where golden seaweed clambers

upon you and the cliffs, i thought of how death comes

not upon you but nudges you in

a mauve decline into smooth open water.

this, i guess, you have always known, and that’s

why you have always loved the noises children loved,

that sane laughter, that tide that has pulled them. 

the sea is dark and smell of fish tonight and 

it occurred i have felt this thirst for my own language 

before - not for heidegger’s, who disclosed being

as a possibility of certain death. or richter, who said 

to paint is to risk our existence. but something

pliable, soft and fecund, the kind of beauty

that asks for no permission.