Bismarck (2002)

Lave a whale a while
in a whillbarrow ... to
have fins and flippers
that shimmy and shake.
— Joyce, Finnegans Wake

You say you egressed
here through the best
poems, but rather
you’ve sunk here
reaching for the
starlingest gleam
of stellarmost truth.

Your best descends
like a fat Bismarck
three miles down
to a cold grave.
It fails even to
fin that chill absence
at the bottom of the blue.

But what did you expect,
singing there on the
beach? Did you think
she could actually
return to you there,
stepping from some wave?

All that’s just a door
into this salt cellar
of dark savagery.
From her narrow waist
these whale roads where
the music of what falls
is what her smile calls.