Part II
I am making shrines
From the metal I find
The bits of glass and wires and tubing
At least at first
They were shrines
Just piles of like or dislike
Lumped together
Wired and strung
And hung and hammered
Until they stood alone
In the corridors
Or swayed hanging
From the grate of the ventilation shaft.
Then some of them
Talked to me in my dreams
The round one with the
Red panel face
Whispered about cities
Reaching to the sky
And the plastic tube man
Walked when I wasn't looking
I'd find him
Down in the cargo hold
Watching the doors.
Eventually
I had to dismantle him
Though now his ghost is there
Watching quietly,
And I cannot get him to leave.
I have heard
New things on the ship
A hum grows lower
And louder beneath the floors
On the corridor with all the numbers
But the floor's metal grate
Won't give
So I just leave offerings
Of copper wire
Bent in the shape of animals
Bits of dried service bread
And oil collected from the drip in the machine room
Held in the square red plastic caps
That cover the switches of my steel room.