My Flesh, My Heart

A little more than a gallon of blood
Churns under my skin
A bucket’s worth of ocean water
Sloshes in the pail
the six-year-old carries
across the white sand
full of Look Mom treasures
a starfish, a hermit crab, some snails
The sand and water jerks wildly
Nearly spills on the
Striped beach towel
where each treasure dies
all summer long
suffocated and boiled
in clear water, no longer blue,
when carried away in a red plastic pail.