Portrait of the Full Moon’s Light as Warning Sign

Portland, 2015

From my balcony, I saw the moon slip through
the pillows of June stars until its mystery cracked

the ripples sweeping through the sea. We were
close enough to hear my cousin’s ethereal guilt

crashing through the tide of each day

but we didn’t
know how to listen. We didn’t even know

we needed to. But, as the hours twinkled in the sky’s
reflection, his guilt swelled into its own

silt-tongued tide. We watched summer curdle
into salt and shell, not knowing we had to

raise them to our ears

to hear his cry for help. As stones of naïvety
pebbled our toes

& towels fogged our arms with fuzz, our beach
afternoons decorated

our daze: summer exposing

each seashell left by the Atlantic as the sun
withered each story inside them, each fragile whisper

pleading to us, pleading to be saved. We didn’t
know. Beneath our salt-licked feet, we crunched

their pleas back into syllables. We were
anchored in ignorance—shaping sandcastles

with our shovels, unaware of the warnings

that would eventually fill their tide-
eaten moats, once, the indifferent waves rose

to claim them. Afterward—after the ashen skin
and last breath, after we tidied the memorial

into drawstring Hefty bags & set them by the curb, you say
he never asked for help. The truth is, he shouldn’t have

had to. The truth? We should have spotted the evening’s
penetrating light, pooling across every surface. The answer

was there—every night. Like moonlight, I said, pointing
to the seashells covering his new home

as the pallbearers marched, their shadows casting
silent music into the evening air. Even through polish

and the pearls of our tears, they would’ve
told us everything

while there was still time. That summer, we still could’ve

brought him back to shore, back from guilt. If only
we’d cupped them to our ears and thought to listen—