Excavating a Shipwreck 

When my brother and I were little girls          sleeping on a civil war            cot, the shadow
I made breached flannel and we thought
I would
die. My father said he didn’t know this would happen to me.

The archive door rusts                         shut. I put in  my fourth work order.

I sleep at the foot of the bed. I rub my nose in it.
A fleet of ships. A fleet of ships waiting                     for signal clearance. 

Hospice care may feel counterintuitive.        Like pitching a begging body
off the deck.

This snow in winter lesson.                This coyote on the trail ahead.           and so much pain.
and so much pain             that this coyote might be made of pain.             Until I am wrenched
back                 by a benevolent gentleman.

How much touch
can one handle?          

I am not resentful of the benevolent hand

forcing my jaw

down. What’s left

on the bone. I am not resentful
but what will it stir up?

Methods of restoration may feel counterintuitive.
After a flood, submerge it.

Cat in a December alley, it crawls back when I’m fat and warm again.
In his mother’s truck driving past the corpse            of a mill, he punches my arm
saying he did excellent work dragging       me back     to health. 

Mud now. The dementia of it.                                                 That it is mud now. 

It is no longer a question of                                                              
  savior.

Counterintuitive yet
let the red rot flake
against
ungloved hands.

When was it ever

I am approaching a sandless sea. Something heavy                           I have forgotten.

I look behind me not knowing the word for wagon
just my hand and its years on the handle.