T H I N K

I picked up a limpet shell from the beach
and started playing with it, through my fingers.

When I happened to look down at it
I felt a frown breach my forehead.

Inside the shell was written a word:
the word THINK.

Which I did.
I did think.

I’d fingered many shells in my time,
but never one with something written inside it

— or not that I’d ever noticed.
There’s a chance I had done so unknowingly.

THINK

It was bloody hard not to think.

THINK

Did the limpet that lived there write it?

Maybe THINK was already written inside the shell
before the limpet started living there.

I picked up another limpet shell,
which had nothing written inside.

vss #15