Let them come

With their dressers of deal.

Nothing is ever going to again feel real. 

Unless it's by the shore

and the smell of salt is everywhere 

spraying up from the ground, spiraling in the air. 

Or a corner 

of the house from where voices carry softly past midnight,

then waking up to find the same spot warmed by morning light. 

Maybe 

in years 

the shells will crack apart

beneath the footsteps of Spring.