People laugh around a plate of moving squid
They are served
abalones as appetizers:
you **** the animal out
and devour him.

Everything here is maritime:
Wheel, ring, buoy, compass, fishnet, gargoyle

I am illiterate for the menu,
but I devour the fish I pined for

Outside in the fish tanks some light is breaking
I see air bubbles rising.

In my mind I have created a garden
populated with insects who don't bite
and birds who don't **** on my paper when I write
there is a lily pond, with frogs who know Bach

However, they keep quiet. This is my refuge
where nothing pierces through the surface
every ripple is merely the smile of an admirer
every distortion the promise of a silence

I sit at a table, turning all that I see
into bold and brazen words; forever
in love with language, forever beholden
to her blossoms, that lie rotting at my feet