shelves

      Counting shelves:

Been on seven slides
          Of this song.
    By tides, I’ve been dumbly wrong;
  By tsunami, I’ve been right up to shallow shatter
            On seawall.

    You won’t chance a call,
      While I mix some methodically
Box-inscribed batter.
          And why would you?
      I’m a footnote, vanished ‘yond our sharp slope.

      But love is true.
          She stands staunchly ‘gainst the storm,
Safekeeps us warm,
      And sets within-reach-the-ladder
    We might, on courage, climb to blue—

            O’er burning berm,
  ‘Cross embers, broken bell, and yellow tatter;
    Lifted by some sublime swarm
          Of honeybee-hope
To the safest sides

      Of ourselves.