I can’t write poetry about this. I can’t.

to open myself
to the horror
is to let the sea rush in.

already, I
am a thing of sand foundations,
dissoluble & frantic. there is an ocean
of terror
crammed into a shell
hidden deep inside my throat
in the place where I should
be screaming.

it’s one thing
to stand against the tide. to plant myself
where the dune grass grows
& reach back into the rip
for those still caught

but I am salt. I am a thing
codified & unlovable
by those bodies of governance
amalgam; I
am un-personed, un-manned,

a lighthouse tipped & crumbled
from the cliff-top; a wreck
raked over for its cargo, bones left
to sink to silt.

for the pearl must grow,
or so we’re told,
regardless of the oyster,
and if it rips the thing apart

so much the better.

© 2023 Jennifer Mace