she was like a moodier jennifer lawrence,
so many freckles i couldn’t even tell her tone,
but i liked her face.
never saw her flip a smile but noticed
her gasping every once in a while,
and she never moved, even when that
fly landed right on her eye.
she was skilled at wearing her tattoo
as a watch. mastered walking in stilettos
near the water on the rocks.
she had cheekbones that would make your
ancestors drool green
and
she lit up the page with a gaze,
eyes cold and mean.
oh god, how he was beautiful,
the way she looked at him with
life pulsing at her temples,
waiting expectantly like
she’d been here before,
hands held out – falling to be caught,
saved by him, with those strong arms.
oh god, how he was beautiful,
the way he looked at
her, looking at him.
washed ashore, no breath left. rocked to death, their
life emptied into the torturous sea
that swallowed them. promising them lives, but
it brought them back against the wood, against
the rocks. their pale faces charred from the sun,
their thinning brows white with salt. their hopeful
black hair tangled with the splinters, their bones
rattling, their bones done. I pray God saved them,
even if they didn’t believe. please let
there be some mercy in that mystery.
but I’m afraid there are more coming, more
running, being chased, fearful, while ever
so mournful. lost ones being swallowed up
by the sea, washed ashore with no breath left.
it’s nothing, it’s everything
it’s the stuff fraying at the edges
it’s the goo left in-between
try to outwit it, run and escape it
but it’s clever, it’s faster
go blind when that mania warps shit
it’s nothing, it’s everything
the ailment that’s in your brain
leaving us stuck in-between
Today, this day, 10 years ago she watched her father die in a cold hospital room during a Nebraska winter.
Today, this day, she decided to go to the beach.
This woman, while resting in an umbrella of warmth, heard a man shuffle by; wearing a blue shirt, his profile reminded her of her father.
The one that could grow a red beard and whose eyes got greener when he was mad. The one whose laugh could wake the dead and the one who hid his sadness with a mask. Until that day – she got the call that he wanted to end it all. One week he would stay at a different hospital, decades before his unluckiness would take him. Decades before the cancer devoured his laugh and made him blow up like a fish. Decades before she saw his last breath.
The man she saw today was shorter than her father, but they shared the same hair color and smile. She was sure his eyes were green and that they sparkled like sand beneath her feet. She would close her eyes and try to recall the ghostly memories of her father. The way he shifted his weight while talking on the telephone. Right foot, left foot, with a sort of rocking motion. The way he sprayed a cloud of Aqua Net on his hair every morning. And the way he never seemed to dry off his hands after washing them; he just shook them in the air while her socks soaked up the water.
Between reading, trying to remember, and wave gazing; she spent a great deal of time watching one particular seagull. The fat one with a long neck who bellowed for the others to stay away. The one who looked irritated at the smaller, scurrying birds that busily ran after their shadows. The one who approached her expectantly as she ate her honey mustard pretzels and then was chased by a little girl who reminded her of her daughters. The one with the peach and blue bathing suit. The one with the ponytail that looked like one long curl down her back. The little one with all the power to chase the seagull around and make him soar away.
This woman longed to borrow the little girl’s happiness, borrow her smile, borrow her power to make the seagull ascend. Especially today, this day, when 10 years ago she was forced to say goodbye to her father.
