A Shell Poem by Peter Kane Dufault

And here's this shell of a crab,
this implosive symmetry worn
by a long storm of cis-marine light
to a thing white as sea-salt and weightless
as a wasp nest. Two lobes
only—the claws gone
out of their portholes—two
matching lobes left, (and right)
like a brain's … It's amazing

at what minute tolerances something,
though crushed under the sea's grey
palisades of shuddering iron,
details this ineffable cortex—not
to mention others, ashore—
by the billions, and in utter indifference,
or as if dissatisfied, casts
every last one away.