Even if a tremble       if earth smoothed away
reveals a dark wild       never marrow or milkweed

Listening was enough       to not break free from
this breathing center       Sleep was never whole

or fertile       How is this country still here?
Made of sequoia or salt       a fractured core

a restructured circumference       A pain so near
to light       it keeps to undergrowth       where music

Seeing was enough       to keep to the walls
or the walls to the heart       to cormorant lungs

To a door to the bay       let loose       the curve of spine
sand blown to bottles       to leftover sleep       Still living?

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Recommended reading: Alan Weisman's The World Without Us.