Treading Water
       

I came to the beach

but did not shave

my legs I used to

think my body was

a torch held

out before

me all gazes

drawn like muted

wings in the waves

I lose all sense

of time spitting

salt and swallowing

it still how

could anyone fall

asleep with their eyes

open the planes

above the shore dragging

banners for buffet

TREADING WATER

specials and parasailing

tours seem elegiac

for what

I don't know every

day feels like a great

goodbye the sun

a swallow of hot

tears whose job is it

to worry

about the cemeteries

in heavy

rain hurricanes

picking up whole

oceans whole oceans

suspended

in the sky how do we make

love like two storms

one riding the currents

over land east

another offshore

born turning

inland to meet each

slowing in

their angry

embrace the umbrellas

crack in the wind

whole families walk

their slow legs

back in

against the rip

tide to the beach because it begins

to rain a light

rain they don't want

to get wet salt stings

an eye but we don't

call an eye

a wound I find my

feet still fit

my prints in the sand

I arrive back

on land looking for

my!

I think it's there

in my spine

holding up my

weight the everything

else I almost expected

to have been

lost at sea

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Copyright © 2019 Emilia Phillips All rights reserved
from Hemlock
Diode Editions
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission