Poor sand dollars—
low tide and pillaged by gulls
on a jag—every shell
beached. Raw,
as we are. Shaped for the breath,
edges have slits
fine as buttonholes.
Noonday’s stun of beaks
collapse the central star,
and five tiny doves
fall from its heart, as if
pieces of heaven
salt this desolate shore.
Torn, yet tacking
my haphazard way
through the incoming chop,
come, let me be, through
prayer, an ark for your sorrow.
First appeared in Where the Sky Opens (Cascade)
Laurie Klein is the author of the poetry collection Where the Sky Opens (Poeima Poetry Series, Cascade), and an award-winning chapbook, Bodies of Water, Bodies of Flesh. A past recipient of the Thomas Merton Prize for Poetry of the Sacred, Klein has also been nominated for Pushcart Prizes in poetry and Creative Nonfiction. She lives in the Inland Northwest.