In my next life I want to come back as a seashell
I want the ocean to call me over and over again
so I can always remember what it feels like to go home.
Because there is nothing more beautiful than the way
the ashes of all my dead family members have been scattered
into the sea like salt, as if the waves would find a place
for them to rest between the ribs of giant tectonic plates.
Like Noah, I want to be swallowed whole,
so far and so deep that even the North Star will have trouble
pinpointing my location above the water.
In my next life, I want to come back as a seashell
so someone will finally fall in love with my echo.