She discards the shell of her last life
wishing she could send it far off
into the future, or to some other distant place,
but instead she does what all shell collectors do,
which is to pile old shells in a grisly heap
in the corner of the room where she ponders
the first year that she grew a shell.
Her shell is heavy as a giant clam.
It took decades of angry multiplication and soul
division to finally outgrow it and, when she casts it aside,
it’s just a short time before she puts on
another shell bigger and thicker than the first.
Though it’s enormous, the shell hides
only what everyone can already see.
There are other shells, too,
each more ponderous than the one preceding, and each time
she outgrows a shell and casts it aside, it makes a noise
like teeth gnashing, which is exactly the sound
of Past colliding with Present, and soon
there is room in her heart wholly for empty shells
and gnashing teeth. On the rare days
when the sun comes out
it’s like opening a letter from a favored friend.
Still, she carries two umbrellas
just in case it storms and when someone tries to wrest
her umbrellas from her, she defends her right to carry them
because battle is easier than learning to drink
from the pouring rain. She returns
to her room of discarded shells
to pick up Flamingo tongue,
Atlantic slipper, glossy dove,
queen conch, the shell of a sea turtle -
and soon finds that the giant clam,
Sovereign of the Sea,
is no longer suitable as armor.
Exposed,
she looks for shelter, or a place where her life
can burst forth like flowers sprung from the desert
after the end of a long drought.
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