Seeing Clearly

Sea change today,
if you can call it that
this far from the ocean.
Overcast, cooler;
all the notes struck
by recent sunshine
have turned minor.

Sunday, I heard voices inside.
They were bells tolling an ending.
Tuesday, today, I hear nothing
but the neighborhood,
quiet at last.  Everyone’s
at work or school.  I should be
working too.  I am working,
in fact, or so I say when I’m asked

because I’m glad not to be interacting
with anyone right now.  Too many
voices from outside still
the ones inside,
and I want to be able to hear.

They were silver, nugget-rough,
precious.  They cut me
when I pressed them.  They told me
what I already knew, so I trusted them
and feared them.

I don’t hear them now.
Maybe it was the sun
and warm earth, drying audibly
after days of rain,
that spoke to me
and suggested that I needed
to die.

I don’t know why light
would amplify sound,
but I do know I can taste
a terrible scent of ocean
on the wind today:
a dull flavor, lead dull,
no glint to it.

I await the return
of the sunshine
with my ears
cocked and afraid.