a calendar of salt & tides
& birds scything the full sky
it took me so long to write this
it’s over — but that’s
the way with everything we
say in unison with briny
tongues— tide me
over — if you put
something in a circle— no one
will want to cross it
•for April I will try to work out one page of a draft per day from a long poem in sections of 10 pages each
seastruck grid of skies
a whole year— more
skies than days
in five days I saw
at least sixty skies —
gray wool—broken orange
glass—burning—oystershell—
gray cool—boyfull—clearing blue—
mirror calm—gentle cloud commas—
whirled up storm waves—
•for April I will try to work out one page of a draft per day from a long poem in sections of 10 pages each
•opening 3 lines in response to Mary Burger’s Skies of 2020 — for example https://www.instagram.com/p/CIEBwR8BCg2/ — but I haven’t yet responded to this work in the manner it deserves
in marginalia season—
hawkless salt-hag
the tide adds or subtracts
a causeway— a lightening
line between the deeper
blues & though I
look with adoration at these
lines for hours
nothing comes
back to me
•for April I will try to work out one page of a draft per day from a long poem in sections of 10 pages each
at this time of a winter’s day one can see
the light turn & begin to flake & burn
& while it’s a turn I always notice
something far away changes key
there is no perfect
line except the wrackline
which is infallible
it’s too cold to do
anything complicated
come to bed come to bed come to bed
•for April I will try to work out one page of a draft per day from a long poem in sections of 10 pages each
•first two lines are from J.A. Baker’s The Peregrine, entry for 21 December
the sky keeps bright
eyes on us — we
look up into the cold
the tide makes
a friction like
a song in glass
that is the tide sings
while it spins in glass
so deep midwinter the light turns iron
there is no end to your tongue
•for April I will try to work out one page of a draft per day from a long poem in sections of 10 pages each
•the tide singing in glass is after Luke Jerram’s acoustic installation / sculpture “Tide” : https://www.lukejerram.com/tide/
find your V goose
whirl the fuck up
warm winter windows
ladybugs on them
oyster comma
oyster ear
half a conch crown
clam fan light
my oldest hears sounds that I
cannot — including the sky
•for April I will try to work out one page of a draft per day from a long poem in sections of 10 pages each
we move singularly like
a liquid — soft shallows
what if instead of horizon
lines we read low
drain tides boats soft aground the middle
littoral sugar kelp woven — I will never have
enough I say to your
sleeping inscrutable shape
snow on snow snow
on snow fallow waves
•for April I will try to work out one page of a draft per day from a long poem in sections of 10 pages each
the sky spangled with crows
a night body of water
serrated wrack saw wrack toothed wrack
rockweed spiraled tidy into
a whole universe — bladderwrack
is a cunt in the granite—
textured uncertain driftlines
things aren’t always so
conscientious as to draw
their soft edges for us
•for April I will try to work out one page of a draft per day from a long poem in sections of 10 pages each
•the image of rockweed spiraled into a tidy universe is a response to the work with seaweed by artist Jeannet Leendertse, (on insta @jeannet_leendertse)
