message in a bottle

we’re just sailboats, aren’t we,

two rickety brown dots

lost in the vast blue,

drifting

ever further

apart,

no matter

how far

we reach,

lean over

the edge and

yearn for

the touch

of the

other.

our love is just

a message in a bottle, isn’t it,

one bobbing speck

that rides

the waves

like the birds do,

the only one

that doesn’t

soar but

sinks instead,

water seeping

through the

cracks; broken

glass blossoms,

petals that

unfurl and

wilt,

twist and

flutter away

into the

deep,

deep blue.

in the end, we

were just pollution, weren’t we,

salt-tainted spatters of parchment,

floating far

beneath the

waves, where

no light illuminates

the ribbon

I tied

round the

rolled-up scroll

before sending

the bottle

to sea,

or the

way I

crossed

my O

when I wrote,

Love.

all that’s

left of

us is

the ink

of my

fountain pen,

bleeding into

the murky

depths,

black text

billowing in

wisps

off the

sea-soaked page,

curling like

smoke and

ebbing with

the Atlantic

drift.