A fuchsia smoke
billowing madly.

A lash on soft skin
blossoming red.

A chandelier made of snow
and gold and branches; a planet.

Was the soul an infinite confection
or a bloody slab

pulled from a different dimension,
pulsing like a dog’s tongue?

Maybe it is what we resist
when we try not to die, the aching

slices of feeling that should outlive us
but can’t.

When I stopped believing in God
I was on a beach in Florida, rib-deep

in clear, warm water. There was no
one epiphany, just a synthesis of things

I’d been thinking, like a school of silver fish
swimming suddenly together.

A palm tree swayed
while its roots siphoned saltwater.

A constellation of white shells
slipped under the tide.