Howard Firkin
I ply my nothing.
I stand and scan a small horizon, head
to head, for freighters, images of trade,
the commerce that distinguishes the species.

I make no bow wave.
Sea-eagles cruise the waves of heated air
and seek their morning’s work; and I observe,
forgetting in minutest detail, all.

I make no wake
but foot prints scribbled wildly over sand
and know the three directions life can take:
north past the head, south past Short Point, and here,

among the shells
and crab claws, bleached driftwood, the single gull wing.
The surf fans lacy patterns on the sand;
its own horizon. I stand watching it.