Relic Ocean
by Ronald Linder
swirls the scavenged beach a thousand feet
below the road, becalmed by the
ice-crystals Martini in that bar in Jenner
at the instep of the mountain
wilder than dreams of food or sleep,
frost-fire ocean won’t drown rim-ants now,
but the fin-filled waves will
eat everything eventually,
waters coerced to bed will wake at the end
when earth explodes or freezes,
fringes to battered quartz …
This convex plate of soup,
moiling, crackled bowl of mother’s blood
terrifying with its love,
wet souvenir of who we are.