Saltworks Before Sunrise

Before the sun, the plant is all silver lungs, pipes sweating moonlight into narrow gutters, the sea arrives in tanker-breath and static, gulls stitch white noise over the catwalk rails.

Membranes hum like held violin strings, pressure presses brine against its own name, salt blooms on valves, a frost that tastes of storms, and every gauge needle leans toward morning.

Inside the control room, coffee fogs the glass, maps of reservoirs glow green as deep orchards, somewhere inland, kettles wait in dark kitchens, empty as cups cupped in two sleeping hands.

When first light opens, water leaves here clear, carrying no memory of wrecks or tides, only a thin bright music in the mains, a river taught to travel underground.