The amniotic waters of the bay
lap past the yachts , the cruisers at their moorings,
and past my body , floating in the ripples.
High above , a jet invades the north and leaves behind its long white plume
to cleave the sky , with a silver arrowhead glinting in the sun.
It disappears into the cloud , and now I watch
the lovely long slow wheelings of three pelicans winding the world from left to right.
Counter clockwise beneath , a solitary eagle scans the waves for prey ,
and a few unquiet gulls , resenting my passage past their roosts , flap up and around the boats.
Only the cormorants are still , projecting their serpent necks , cautiously eyeing my passing.

Here in the water I am as light as all those uplifted birds , freed of earth’s weight.

I lie at the lowest point of the inverted cone of sight,
focus of the vastness of the sky that funnels
down to my
solitary
self
I draw it to me to spiral outwards to an end I can’t conceive

I am too small to hold it to myself.