The Bottle All Around Her

Her life now is a message in a bottle.  
She sails anywhere, somewhere, nowhere,
it doesn’t make a difference .  

She’ll never break free of the glass all around her.
She will remain anchored to past lovers.  
Her thoughts will never get pass her memories 
of them.   Their gaunt faces will pull her back, 
warning sirens lost in the dissolving  ocean,
covering  the killing rocks awaiting  on the beach.

Days leave her.  She forgets the sun. 

The tiny people on the forever slipping 
away shore she can see but never beach on,
who  wave closer than her eyes perception,
slip her into vertigo, a frenzy unconsciousness 
that leads into night, nightmares
and the wakening horror that the water will always 
be around her and she will never know a horizon. 

She is beyond the compass’s direction, 
the surety of maps. 

There are more lines on her face 
than waves in the sea. Without the 
comfort of a mirror she will 
always be afraid, stranded, insecure.

In the reflection of the waves
she sees the black clouds above her.
She imagines them the trail of moonlight
that comes  after the storm, the mirage  
that always calms her.  

Surely, she will meet that handsome  
man of long ago and all her memories.  
They will make love forever and ever.  

And then, suddenly he will disappear.
She will look but never find him.
The fog comes, and the rocks await.