The light that kept
her fingers brown once
opens onto the beach,
across the dunes,
past the pines,

then stalls but a second
above the clearing
where a pitcher pump
and rusty cup
lie abandoned in weeds
beside a shed.

On the limbs
of the oak scrubs
roofing the road
leading in, dew hangs
before it unbuttons
to hundreds of
craters in the sand.

The light that made
her words day once
closes its hand and lies
down like the wind,

the weeds and tracks
and waves tucked
tightly in before
the great mountain.