Driving home through the pang of loneliness, child asleep behind me and my old ideas like broken eggshells in the gutter, sharp as discarded moons

It has always been easier to find in the night, the cold beach at the edge of the world.

I feel your hearts as living clockwork, shooting stars, hopping mice dashing through freezing sand in a cold, dark bright night. In your face I find my own, we reflect each other. Your hands are full of my tears.

Somehow we hold the keys to each other’s locks. I find a little freedom for you, gasp a breath of clear air for myself. I live only in your humanity. I run my fingers through her hair, call to hear his voice from miles away, hold their daughter’s hand.

Here, alone under alien skies, look for something to bring back for us both. Grass climbs high through the garden, the wind blows through the laundry on the line. I thought once I needed to find greatness to change the world. It’s been a painful cancer to exorcise. In dreams she kisses my mouth and her lips are a black ocean, all the shipwrecks dreaming in her breast. Shedding my skin like a snake, somehow the music is still the same as it ever was.

The tides draw me far from the waking world. I see your forms in every shadowed tree, stars strung in your hair. I can’t name the song but it moves me. Blood in my mouth, spitting teeth into my palm. Fair exchange. It’s a long road but worth the walk.