We swim through oil-stained water                    
slick on our swollen skin with stolen
cars and broken refrigerators
under us. We recycle words between us:
We're going somewhere
while swimming in circles
around decaying bark
torn from cypress trees.

Strangers down the street tear
through rusted roofs and paint
messages for helicopters:
HELP
4 PEOPLE
1 DOG
They sing to themselves to fill the silence.
The crashes of our arms against water drown the voices.

Water evaporates in late summer sun
leaving faint marks on walls of evacuated
houses hollowed by termite mazes.
With water weighing us down, we crawl
up rotting stairs of a house with a neon orange X
painted on the crumbling stucco.
We collapse on the porch:
bodies curl into themselves.
This is where I'm from. Don't pull me out.