On the Shore

“Go to the beach,
Go there alone and listen.”
Something in me resisted
As sometimes we revel in our stuckness
Cling to our burdens while cursing their weight
But the heat spurred me

At the first shiver of a spent wave at my feet,
I wanted to wade, let the saltwater bathe my skin
But even more
I wanted to walk
As far, as fast as I could
At the edge, where calf-deep water couldn't slow me

Walking stirred what had been stagnant
Love, anger, desire, confusion
layered like sedimentary rock
Running from something
Deluding myself that I knew
what I was running toward

I watched a man
lean over to take the hand of his tiny daughter
who feared the tide
Something broke open inside me
Recalling myself as that little girl
daunted by the sea's immensity
Envisioning myself as her protector
If I could find my way

I walked until an inlet blocked me
watched it deepen with the tide
wanted to jump in, swim across, walk on
to be stranded on the other side
Waves pooled at my knees,
as a man waded past me
to the waist, the chest, the shoulders
then looked back and waved

I turned around.

I wanted to walk
I was not yet ready
to cross.

Appetite

When we miss someone, what do we really miss?
The person, or
How we feel with them?
My God, how we use people.
As pacifiers
security blankets
pain relievers
vanity mirrors
vibrators
We are animate lumps of appetite
Barely held back from
eating ourselves and each other alive.

One Year Ago Today

One year ago today
On the beach on Coronado island
We lay side by side on the sand
With tears of joy and emotion in your eyes
You said to me:
"I've realized
that I'm very much in love with you
and I hope to be on this beach with you
next 4th of July."

You are a liar.

I don't know if you were lying then,
or later when you said the things
I wish I could forget.
I don't think you know the truth yourself.
I know I'll never understand.

You don't know what love is.
You know nothing
of commitment
of compassion
of consideration
You know only how to gratify yourself.
You care for nothing but your own immediate comfort.

I wasted my love on the desert of your empty heart
And now my heart is barren
I was blinded by your shallow beauty
And my vision is still poisoned.

I want to wash my heart clean
I want to burn you out of my mind
So that one year from today
One year ago today
Will have no hold on me.