Before dawn
I walk to Lettuce Lake
to the observation deck
above the Hillsboro River
and hang my hammock
between two perfectly placed
top posts.
In the cool stillness
before mid-morning’s scorch
I rest in a composition of closed eyes
and ears open
to the great seabirds of Tampa Bay.
Their clacks and chitterings and gutturals
fill the belly of my mind
and cause it finally to sleep
a sleep of the rarest kind
a sleep of weightlessness and light,
one that allows the hidden to be heard
one that allows my body to catch
the manifold nimbleness of being

I awake to a consciousness so thin
I think that it’s at its very end
and this circling cry of osprey
is the sound of my oblivion
the sound of my vacant vast surrender