Rocks are notched with sea limpets, and the pockets

limpets leave once they’ve sealed into the rock and know

themselves most inside it, shell swelling,

softening the stone. You can sketch

their home-scar with your thumb, the X

the body can’t stop returning to, little mollusk

driven by the seas then sealing again to the same

known. My glorious wife and I joke about home, grooves

in the rock we land in again and again. I am from the soothing

of PF Chang’s, the shoe stores in the mall, the lit waves

of others exchanging money for calm. Before that, my people

are from fear: my great- grandfather left,

hidden in a wagon of straw. He crossed the ocean early, just before

he couldn’t. I am from fear. I steer

clear of harm if I can, wear an extra sweater and don’t let

my ankles buckle. Oh beloved, I will try to be bold. The body longs

backward and forward, backward and forward.