Turtle

I’m dreaming the old turtle back.

He walks out of the water,

slow,

that shell with the water on it

the sun on it,

dark as the wet trunks of hackberry trees.

In water

the world is breathing,

in the silt.

There are fish

and their blood changes easy

warm to cold.

And the turtle,

small yellow bones of animals inside

are waking

to shine out from his eyes.

Wake up the locusts whose dry skins

are still sleeping on the trees.

We should open his soft parts,

pull his shells apart

and wear them on our backs

like old women who can see the years

back through his eyes.

Something is breathing in there.

Wake up, we are women.

The shells are on our backs.

We are amber,

the small animals

are gold inside us.