Froth of the Tides and the Further Out

by Paula Bohince

A dime delights flesh before entering the economy
of a pay toilet
             in a café overlooking the Atlantic: one grilled window
filtering a wan sun,
             sun becoming moon in the modest,
             womanly room,
pointillism of fog softening glass, tiles
sea foam green, mimicking the ocean, surgery, old money,
             though the air has a poverty feel—

             black blood flecked in the bowl. Still
I’m renting time. Saying, in mind, beauty rescues
             over the waves’ otherwise suggestions, hiss
and recession, white noise, the coarseness of the world against
the hope of that phrase.
             Beauty rescues. Is that true? I was dead. Then
God rewound my life to its origin.

Published on April 18, 2011