Poem for Thursday, August 9, 2012

In Santa Cruz

What I remember most is the damp sand colonizing between
my toes as you told me how we could technically meet death
at a couple of places. It was high tide at Panther Beach. The waves,
blood-hungry and thrashing. Fiercely azure. The cruel separation
of grace and mercy. I hid the beers and my wallet, dug my feet into
the slick rock, longed for solidarity. We scampered towards the
cave in wide arcs, avoiding the suicidal wet spots. Every time I
gaze out at open water, I think of Edna Pontellier and wonder
whether she was courageous. I envision her seduction by sea
whispers, inching nondramatically towards the Gulf of Mexico.
The wind, coaxing her hat from her head with white gloves. Then
I think how this time is always different. I hugged the outside
of the cave, became a physics problem. Fought the roaring gales.
Can we be more than scattered ash and salt, she once begged me.
For awhile, I suppose. At the mouth, I hid the Pacific from you,
ravenous for the view:

Flawless. Symmetrical. Azure. Tinged with God. So many things
more.