Bladder Blather

Whale bones on the ocean floor
covered by the dust of a million billion plankton,
a scene of desolation so vast, but only seen up close.
Near it’s clear, dark, calm.

In that clear, dark, calm, a fin covered eye
looking down and beyond any feeling of safety
spies a life in ruins,
a tiny speck amid the cosmic dust.

A voice calls out from the bladder of a starfish,
muffled by the hardened skin that keeps it in:

It’s good enough to be alive alone
Or dead upon the throne in life’s own realm.
What is and isn’t comes and goes in swells
The manic lover wearing naught but bells.