Notary of the Tide
Keeper of seals that taste like salt.
The Notary does not argue with the sea. They witness it: the tide’s handwriting on pilings, the way a contract changes when the moon is in the wrong quarter. Their stamp is a promise that the parties have acknowledged the older schedule.
Ports, floodlights, and the thin line where cargo manifests meet weather advisories. Their influence is procedural—until it is not.
Harbor cities, tidal rivers, anywhere cranes write slow arcs against the night.
Cited in the ledger of rain that arrived before its line item and in the dispute over a clock that stopped at high tide. Harbor workers treat their appearances as weather.