the keeper

the huge ornate lamp swims
in a pool of mirroring mercury, the ringed
wick sitting like a dawning sun cresting
an open sea; a wishful design for the overnight crew
carefully peering towards an assumed shore. a giant
of maritime industry tiptoes over a rising earth masked
with the reflection of night.

another two hours slide away amidst half-dreams of
Mr. Pleasonton ankle-high, learning the feel
of a beach-covered rubber sole against his cheek, sand
and salt styled into the shine of his scalp like the spotted
brush stroke of an amateur impressionist copying greats.

a pained groan crawls through the bones of this
lighthouse as the metal guts reach the extent of their whined.
it’s 62 steps to the crank and every chipped and worn
marble stair threatens each aching, swollen ankle to repeat this
process. by the time this not-that-old keeper reaches the top,
his lungs scream out for anything other than the cold
salt that blows in from the sea and has to piss.
he hoists himself just enough onto the ledge and makes an attempt
to shower the rocks below, but skies are clear and the night is deep.

hopefully the profuse sweat that now pours down the
strangely pink face will suffice for now, as another groan shakes
the balance of his hope. he knows there is a ship inching along
the cold horizon, all eyes unsuspectingly staring right at him and his
broken man as the lamp’s liquid spin begins to falter. he could not
wind the crank 127 times and watch the tanker’s candlestars
drift on a nightman’s guess toward certain calamity, could laugh
slightly at the scream of rusting metal that will break the
gently assuming monotony of water and feel grinning vindication toward
an uneducated politician. he elaborates these all-too-familiar
images again, as he did two hours before and will two hours from now,
and shuffles behind the lamp. he cranks and counts and sweats and
coughs and curses every muscle aged too quickly in this house of the sun.

127. hands on knees, the rejuvenated spin caresses his back with a
dancing flame. the next sweep bathes his bloodied eyes with gold.
a third has two fingers dipped in the bath of the lamp, cool and slick
against dry, nailess fingers. it rolls down his rising arm into the sleeve
of his peacoat and crawls through his armpit to his waistband. there’s a
barely illuminated lick as two silvered fingers pop into a chapped mouth
and come out clean. another metallic groan creeps
through the strobing house, but not amongst the wallstones,
but thick in the air like a penitent wind.

it’s here, in this high, that he can never remember if she is the ship
or the lamp, if he is the mercury or the walls, and who exactly leads
the other to shore. either way, he is
poison
poisoned
poisoning,
she is floating mirrored.
and the sea scrapes her belly against the rocks and will
always turn to earth,
eventually.