They built a new aquarium. To keep us
busy. What of it? They felt the ache 
of blank space there. The full 
and beating hollownesses. 
Knocking on the door—space rang, bleated, 
and ran away. 
And why shouldn’t it? Faced with
such necessity, jellies let themselves
be eaten. Holiness isn’t all religious, 
just unknown. Clasping a stranger’s hand 
in the aquarium aisle 
like flailing rope on the last helicopter 
leaving the colony. The last ray of light 
sweeping from the old lighthouse. 
Took on those stairs, once, winding all the way 
up, to look at everything 
from above. Each creaking 
plank, coming face to face 
with the space. Coldness in the walls’ 
bric-a-brac. Floating up, 
the light 
source. I emanated from the lighthouse. 
My body broke into beams.
What of it? No wind on blank days, only existence. 
Fumbling with cotton caught 
in a distant monsoon,
the soil
lets itself be soaked.