An Insular Life

a calm
then the roaring wall of the eye
as we sailed to the world
from an insular life
from the boughs that had sheltered us all of our lives
from the sun's red blooming
with a shadow on every life
as we laid in the dark
through the thundering nights
and awoke to an ocean of shimmering white
where the hull scrapes on the silent ice
and the gulls on the frozen ropes
oh lights on the floor
let the audience rise
let them file through the halls
still assured in their lives
until the sky shudders open
impossibly wide
and the room glows in the sudden light
and they are gone
they are gone for life