skeins spiral above coffee
where the screen remains unsewn and
blank as the seawater that
day before you flung stones and
disrupted the smoothness of my stomach
sending concentric voices
whispering to the shore where
tongues in conch shells
lapping say they won't be here long
we can break but we will not move
and I don't know how to tell you
that these letters we crochet
and stuff down wires with blunt pins
may stitch holes fraying in our hearts
but cannot knit a staff
that can part the sea