(Written for the survivors of Hurricane Katrina)

In an underwater bubble your words come pell-mell,
tumbling blocks of sound baffled by the unordinary.
Silence is a lisp, a watery stammer as you pull my hand
and I glide along an uneven bottom. Spoils of a venom hiss drift by,
an armchair and a lamp for reading anchor the ceiling.
There is your mother’s rosary, a broken pitcher, the pink face of her doll.
I can see the sky but cannot reach it; the splintered camelback shotguns fold
like tissue paper around our hearts.
A refrigerator spoiled becomes a float lodged against a clock.
It is your grandfather's and he speaks without a voice.
A fish swims by under glass, becomes a rainbow when his hand strikes distance.
We float beneath oxygen and speak in tongues as drums and zydeco,
a wet pull on the sax form the second line.
Safety is an umbilical cord to the stars,
yet your arm presses into my back, circles my waist.
We surface, gasp and cry.









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