173 Sea Turtles

scientists hauled the first
body off the beach. a stone 
with ideas becomes sea turtle;

all covered in cold green weed & muck,
eyes half-open. 

do fossils die?

they removed 
173 sea turtles 
from the shores of Cape Cod,
death makes souvenirs,
hangs necklaces from
their mouths.

i read about them
in bed from the quiet 
light of my phone &
i want to be one of them,
one of the dead sea turtles.

i put on slippers
& drove all the way to 
Cape Cod to stare at
the dark blood water.

the waves were angry & 
begging & i sat in the sand
& tried to reason with
the ocean.

i told the Atlantic 
that it wasn't her fault,
that she had done all she could.
the tide limped back &
the water frothed like meringue.

they say the sea turtles
froze to death, they can't
usually swim so far north,
but the water had been warmer
in the summer. they were
looking for food.

i want to know what they 
thought about as they froze,
i would think about the texture
of my body in the water,

the poetry i should
have written if i had had hands
the songs that existed only
in my body,
my eyes becoming 
pearl necklace beads. 

what did they regret?
was it slow?
did they hope to come
back as another animal?

i hope to come back
as a sea turtle.