ANCIENT COINS FOUND OFF THE COAST OF SARDINIA

ANCIENT COINS FOUND OFF THE COAST OF SARDINIA

Ancient coins found off the coast of Sardinia

the AP article read I read when the morning had sped

past the saving of light the previous weekend

golden, silver or bronze gleamed something

and the diver alerted the authorities, the paper said

authorities over what I thought

the diver’s uncertainty floating amid the seagrass

as to what he saw really, illuminating the sea miasma;

those in charge of the conditions of mind or heart

necessary to find such things?

why this diver on this particular day

and how did they swirl up this way

the coins from the 4^th century

No one can say, is saying or asked to say

but I wish to know something about the timing

divinely appointed is it?

how it is that wreckage is found

and salvaged

suddenly brought to light

after aeons on a random is it, Monday

or earlier if the reporter filed a late story

a vast treasure 50,000 coins revealed

off the coast of Sardinia, is it irrelevant glory

washed up

and is this a sign we should pay attention to

most especially out of the all the news in print today

the ancient spectre of gold or bronze or silver on

a tempestuous day long over, signalling us frantically?

I don’t know, forewarning something indicating something

something tugs at my heart to say before this feeling slips away

into foam dissolving like lost homes, directions, horizons

possibilities no longer possibilities

latitudes of lace on the waters capped, the story capped too on a

message that later we will know we should have heeded

or interpreted far far differently at the time

I want to assign it some meaning

or perhaps Someone already has beyond

its being

upturned in the fields of turquoise

for close inspection a boon to archeology

I wish to sweet mythology

parted forever from secret habitation

as from long long dreams.

mary angela douglas 6 november 2023