Where words we would have said

were swallowed, like sailors sacrificed

to the waves, possibility slipped shut.

If only we could have heard the words

we sang in secret to each other;

if only we had not died there,

feeding like fabled monsters

upon our embittered flesh;

if only we had relented

to the siren’s cold seductions,

then the screams in the waves

which smashed upon the sea wall

would not be lost to the blind pulse 

of froth and spume across the wreck.

(June 30, 2021)