Excerpt from [The Pool]

ZOE IMANI SHARPE

Continuing past ports

Conferring

As reinforcements cause you

Tipping over into commotion

On approaching land from sea, there is a scent, like hot rock

A woman, outside of a car, yelling something harsh into a cellphone

As you approach

To realize she is you, inferring threat

You wake again, with your history fears

Furious sieving

Once ongoing, ongoing

Then your father lived in a church, a motel

Conscription, several

several times

Substrate of common minerals, the Romans used

Crushed coral

The kind found in highway pools

In one century (surplus) (debt)

“A solid roof over one’s head is one of the prime requirements of a civilized existence”

Six trips through snow, heave into place

Your neighbour greets a plump tomato, grown from seed

Then all the pitch-black kissing (gold chain on Marcus) Sticky

Malt barbeque, locker-room-tang

Not at all the first instance of power

Plaza walled off from the lake

When the cops grabbed your father by the neck, pulling him down to the ground, as if wanted

A case of mistaken identity, a black

Plastic bag, same as the subject in question

(polymer)(discount Air Jordans)

Two blocks from home, the pool

Interstices, portals, afternoons, directions

Occur as leisure memory

Shale beach, wetted

Thong flip-flop, spongy

Heel snapping tile

Tongue depressor

Free Swim, Rec Swim, Lane Swim

It’s a drugstore swimsuit, it doesn’t fit, stretch

It over your vagina

Now go jump in the pool

Fumbling, continuous

Dolomite, until(temporary casing)

(vexed proximity)

Smell of french fries

Shift on one leg (pose) (hope)

Silt lens widens beyond the eye

Say nothing of the rays, bending

You have become a thing that moves in its own time