Breadcrumb #311

JULIA EDWARDS

My body is an inlet
    in a ripple
I tie up    my shadow  
to the nearest   docked neighbor 

On a bright day
I’m a droplet   gone rogue
     refracting a child   in yellow boots
picking up a shell
    helloing   without echo 

   I help myself   
to the laws of physics
   I help you
walk the dog, unpack boxes
wearing    a raincoat inside, I wade

While the world moves around
  in my  apartment   
I am America’s greatest
whirlpool in the light spot
Kibble glistens   from the rug 

The heaviness of the sun
will crush us but love
is still      the boy
on the burning deck
     trying to recite   "The boy stood
on the burning deck"
         You know the one

I borrow a line
of salt   blown out through  the nose
      of a bigger whale
This is what I mean by landscape
A sea monster I can't pronounce
rolling up at the edges   with references
    I don't know   anything about
that footnote / the epic / your
ghosts / those sirens

but I hear them
from the street   running
with expiring meat
while I tread the Mediterranean
    a foreign couple
on a poop emoji   passes by
holding hands   through the current
I want to make someone cry

The world is ending & I'm nearsighted
  I throw an iris
perpendicular   to the end
of the earth’s rotation
  It throws back
a wet rope / some kids
  eating sandwiches /
a watering can / 
broken vanity  mirror floats

The night zips up its jeans &
   hello, I am    your born again water
     unresponsive   to the tide
when the moon calls

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