Fallen Sea Star

The chilly North Pacific:

we build a fire for the moths,

a lamplight. Their wings, angry

with flames. Sky: dim and small.

In your standing stillness, you are

an old clock

that has run out of chimes.

The small hours of the past,

a fossil, a nerve. I hand you a flask.

You say: ‘August is dying.

The stones are cold.’ In your hand,

a dead sea star. Summer bronze

burned into your skin. Your eyes,

moist black pearls.

Along the horizon, dark fog

is an oil slick floating against the sky’s

gray wall. Your silhouette, solitude,

the wind’s nimble stitching of your hair.

You say: ‘Memories are wounds

infected with melancholy,

that push the past deeper into ruins.’

—the old houses sold, the Village

demolished. To dust. 

You ask: ‘Why did you leave?’

I answer: ‘There is nothing left

to remind me to remember.

After the bricks fell and shattered,

the villagers became anxious.’

You reply: ‘Trepidation is God’s

offering. Listen! There’s no rush

to reach the future’ — a turnpike

of unraveled lives, sun-bleached ghosts,

pale, tired.

All night long moths fly into the light,

into the stars, the flames. The wind stirs

their powdery ashes.

Body against body,

there is deep silence between us.

The waves break. The future rolls in,

disconnects the past.

The sea star falls from your hand.

Make a wish.

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from 'The Translator' ©dah 2015

"Fallen Sea Star " was first published in
'Deep Tissue Magazine'