When you’re alone on Turtle Island
Toes on the edge of an unending ocean
Look out past the horizon
As clouds dip and flutter

At night in your lean-to
The surf and stars nuzzle
Your fire dies
And there’s the sweet smell of cooking

One morning your toe clicks against a bottle
in the surf

It’s been sealed with wax
The note inside beckons
You read it — it’s faded

…! …it is your own note
Your story
Your plea
You hurled it past the rocks on an outbound tide years ago

Now it returns to you

Always we find our escape is up to us

So walk out to the end of shallows
And then past the sandbar
To where it might be over your head

Go! Go now!

Go now or you will stay forever