Sea sponge Heart

My heart is a sea sponge pushing against the salty ribs of my chest, a flood of brackish red floating through memories and age. 

The rings of felled trees ripple out like this heart of mine, like a drop on still water, like the singing of a whale from the deepest blue. 

There is an ocean inside of my heart and beneath that lies a forest and inside that rustle my fingertips picking up stones and twigs and driftwood on a walk through this endlessly chambered world. 

My sea sponge heart soaks it all in and seeps out and up and through. 

Squeeze. 

And release. 

Porous crevices breathe in deeply to fill the negative spaces, to free the empty.

There is no end to the swelling, the bursting, the dripping in and down and over. 

The rings of this tree stream outward, my voice carries into the deep. 

37 ripples through water has my sea sponge heart. 

The salty ribs of my chest heave and give and out it flows.

Into the 38th. 

Into this all.