The net of heaven is cast wide

and I look up

at a frond of glittering white mesh

in wonder, and speak to a man

standing at the rail beside me

and hear him say,

This is all ours now.

We can’t go back.

We drift through ferns

white as the frost on windowpanes.

There are others

but we haven’t been talking.

He is not a person I knew in life.