Can't just vanish

She asks me "what's wrong?"
I reply "nothing"
but even in dreams I'm fenced in.


I'm an uneducated scholar
in this lukewarm fishbowl.
Dying between each
forgiving ripple,
observing how the others fly.

I am the weak with
an impenetrable
titanium mask, and

the bird with concrete wings
scaling the highest mountain
waiting for a hurricane.


My thoughts turn to a skeletal leaf
embedded in the unforgiving pavement.
One of Autumn's fossils.
It's now that I realize: You can't just depart
without leaving some trace.



(Competition poem-Against the ebbing tides)