for Robin Needham, killed in
the 2004 Christmas tsunami

Something
shuddered in the un-

fathomable dark, and a wave
shouldered forth

like an eighteen wheeler
skidding sideways

into oncoming traffic—a wave,
beautiful as snow on a navy sleeve

inhering by the power
of a word,

the word
that shuddered

in each dark cell of the dead
Christ, a wave shouldering forth

like a new heaven, new
earth, clearing away

the old, the impossible—a wave,
a word, terrible as it is

great, great as it is holy
and terrible.