The Wall Has a Tide

There is a mark above the chair.

Not a wound. Not yet a word.

A dark fleck where the plaster keeps looking back.

I tell it, whirl up.

I tell it, bring your pointed water.

The room does not move, but the pines begin inside the paint.

Green pressure. Salt grain. One small door with no handle.

I put my hand against the wall and feel nothing.

That is how it starts.

The nothing gathers. The nothing learns my pulse.

Behind me, the lamp keeps guard over the cup, the notebook, the instrument I have not touched.

I do not ask what made the mark.

I ask what kind of weather can enter through a thing this small.

All night, the wall holds.

All night, the tide comes in without water.