He says a coelacanth stirs
each moment we’re alone,
long and slow: something old
below the surface, timeless,
unknown. I am present,
I think,
as he speaks of long-ago
extinctions, fossils
dug with fingers smudged
in dirt. I experience
him similarly, spiral
ammonites of past lovers
hiding beneath the hard
sedimentary layers, only
my skeleton knowing
death is rediscovery.