Naked and raw  
I bear my soul to the sea
Freed from a shell outgrown

hermit crab
spying an empty shell
moving up in the world

hermit crab
never quite at home
not quite a crab
are you really a hermit?

hermit crab
never at home
for long

shoreline littered

broken shells,

bits of seagrapes,

parts of a dead crab,

and footprints.

One day these grey clouds that linger above
Will give up and allow their rain to fall
The droplets like an echo of my love
A shadow of the leaves that fell in fall

I long to reach up with my hands and grab
Those hideous clouds I wish would crash
Your sign is cancer, the sign of the crab
It seems we are not meant to be, we clash

But I know your eyes, eyes I can't evade
For that I become a slave to that grey
They bear into me as if to invade
I have no complaint, I only say stay

My hearts the flame that you always enrage
Trapping me in passions bottomless cage

Is a common turtle really different from a crab?
They both make their ways slowly, across the dirt and sand.
The mouth and claw don't differ much in ways they're used to grab.
Could a common turtle really be a green-shelled crab?

I’m spiraling and sprawling out
The ugly parts revealed
Like a hermit crab
who’s had his shell taken

Hyperventilating and staring at opaque ceilings listening to the walls
They speak and when they do they whisper of me
They laugh at their corners and close in on me

They grip with brick hands
Face the floor
He feels what I feel
I will merge with him so they will be right
Let them walk all over me
Until I can no longer feel

In the swash zone
a desperate crab somehow overturned,
belly-up. Dome-backed, helpless,
she twitches feet and claws
grasping only air
as seagulls gather, smacking lips.

Shall I intervene?
Who do I favor, crab or gull?
Frankly I have problems with both personalities.

Can’t ignore a creature in distress.
(Who programmed that?)
Wiggle my toes into damp sand beneath the beast.
Flip.
With nary an acknowledgement, crab scuttles
sideways to a spot in the wave wash
where in a flutter of little legs she half-buries herself,
eyeballs above.
Seagulls scream curses.

What did I expect, a thank you?