The Dead Layer

Ten years after Florida and I can still remember that girl,
burning in alchemical fire, joy hungry. She never dreamed
she’d outlive leaving home.           But here I am.
In oil painting, you must first paint the dead layer.
Unseen foundations, lumps and scrapes for depth and texture.
And I took such care with my dead layer, thought
I’d live my whole life there. But it’s been ten years.
My winter skin has lost its tolerance for sun.
Visiting home is a training exercise in breathing underwater,
and I was never the strongest swimmer.      Meanwhile,
I’ve met mountains. Seasons. True hearts.
I curve the palette knife loaded with paint, layer after layer.
For pines and hemlocks, for diving into the Eno quarry sinkhole
and floating down the Haw River with my love.
For October’s pumpkin patches and February’s daffodils.
Summer’s green veiling our nearest neighbor.
Now I know.                     The chroma, the brilliance.
None of it could have happened without rowing in the channel
under the one-lane bridge at Blackburn Point, without Banyan trees
or hibiscus flowers, without those early parties on 39th Street
and the fights at Bayshore, without chain smoking grief
away in the side yard, and loving people at the wrong time,
without sunburns and oranges, all the blue hours,
low tides, crushed white moonshells underneath.