Saltworks at Dawn

At three a.m. the sea is a dark bell, and the plant answers with a throat of pipes. Blue gauges bloom like night flowers on steel. I walk the catwalk hearing brine learn light.

Membranes breathe in their white, patient spirals; pressure hums low, a cello under concrete. Each drop is argued free from its old bitterness, a small republic founded in a valve.

Outside, gulls stitch pale cries through fog. Inside, tanks hold a sky they have not seen. My gloves taste faintly of metal and weather. The floor sweats salt the way old harbors pray.

By sunrise the city will open its mouths of taps, kettles will cloud, children rinse sleep from fruit. No one will hear this midnight orchestra, only morning, clear as glass, in every cup.