Wreckage

1.
Shattered whelk shell on the shore,
brick rounded from waves alongside,
wood from ship or dock long destroyed;
algae clinging to them all says
that origin doesn’t matter anymore —
all that counts is here and now:
here, in the wreckage; now,
in the moment of wreckage.

2.
Vines are growing through
the stripped, twisted frame
of your car in the junkyard.

3.
The solstice sun strikes the stone
it is designed to strike
every year.

Or perhaps the earth
has shifted,
the megaliths have moved,
and it’s hitting 
the same unintended stone 
every year in the same spot.

4.
That sound from the beach?
My low wailing at the end
of the longest day of the year.

I’d hoped you’d be in the waves,
in what the waves bring to shore,
but I haven’t found you yet

though I’ve seized on small things
that seemed to offer hope until
I saw them in the right light.