The Ocean

As Published in the Scarlet Review Literary Magazine

The Ocean 

There’s a roar 
That comes with waves crashing.

Overwhelming—that music 
Of the billow, of that 
Brine filled mass 
Ceaselessly clashing 
With the surface.

A surface on which 
Humans rest, 
Humans lodge, 

Humans watch 
The push and pull through 
Long glass windows 
And listen
Through circadian cycles
While they dream. 

Imagine living in it—in that crash,
Feeling the collision, 
Being a small fish 
Free from the enigmas of the deep, yet
By unfortunate chance, 
Floating too close to land, too close 
To man. 

My, how it’d hurt 
To be stuck 
In the wavering flux 
Of the sand.

But, oh, to see it!
To hear it! To be Enthralled
By it! Captured by it! 

Absorbed 
By how dangerously
The currents cling 
To the beaches; made modest 
By
The unnerving power 
Of the tides.

And oh, to listen to it 
Like a poem, like a song, 
Like a spirit of the 
Universe 
Claiming back it’s woe
Through that roar, 
Through that passion 

And to be 
Completely void 
Of its wrath; 
To be only right beyond,
Just a few feet removed 
From such a 
Peaceful pain; 
To be safe, viewing a sunrise 
On the offing 
With a sister, with a lover, 
With a book about romance 
In hand. 

Wow, how small the moon looks!
A mere skull 
Of the earth,
But how big its reflection
On the waves…

There must be a reason I’m alive—
I see it, 
I see it right at the horizon. 

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