The girl sits sideways,

her arm extended

along the dashboard

of the car. She chews

at her lower lip

until it opens

while her young mother

drives too fast between

the traffic signals.

Glancing off her cheek,

sunlight hits the pearl

in the girl’s earring

as if it is important that they meet

through the windshield glass.

Still she doesn’t see

what the old women

on the Venice beach

discover: driftwood

banked by the night tide

for morning’s pleasure;

small shells whose colors

liven with water and sand.