A Walk On the Beach - Continued
(Part Two)
I go back to a time, (one of many), when we were there, caught in the rain
and salt mist ... little droplets would form on your eyelashes like diamonds, as
if giving value to those eyes beneath them, (that sometimes frightened me
with their ability to see straight into my soul). One of those times in the rain,
when the water soaked my hair and ran down my face, I looked straight at you
and cried, but you couldn't tell ... tears lost in the rain and ocean mist.
Something deep in my being, from that place I never acknowledge, whispered
to me ... and I knew, as surely as I've ever known anything, that this day
would come ... that someday in my future I would be here alone, remembering
and mourning what we had and lost, I looked as deep into you as I could, so
when this day came I might still feel you here with me ... despite the longing
and emptiness and pain of the reality of having you gone.
My face was soaked with tears, but you never knew ... looking straight into
you I cried, but you couldn't tell ... from the core of my being the sadness
flowed from my eyes, taking with it my passion for you, and burning my heart
with the inescapable truth that this day would come ... that despite all the
wishes and hopes and talk and doubtless plans of forever, despite the reality
of you there in my arms, kissing you in the rain, drinking in your warmth ...
Despite the strength of all I was and could be, fighting to deny it could ever
happen, still in my deepest being I knew ... I knew without question it was
only temporary .... only a moment ... why or how I could know this was
beyond my understanding, but it was inescapable ... and now that day was
here, that day I struggled so hard to deny, and worked so hard to avoid. It
had come to me at last, as I knew it would that day, and I hated myself for
being right.
There was a time when we decided to be apart for a while, though I can't recall
the reasoning. I think we were both just searching then, and testing the
boundaries of our love. We used an argument over something silly as the
catalyst, but we both knew better ... we both knew it was something more ...
something larger and necessary and real. I remember we would both come
here, to "our" place ... "our" rock, but at different times.
I remember how I would walk faster on the way here, anticipating ... because,
(knowing I would go there each day), you would take a stick and scratch
messages in the sand for me ... simple messages like "I miss you" and "I love
you" and "someday" and "you're my beacon" ... brief corny treasures that filled
my heart, and kept me warm with hope and purpose and reason. And I would
erase them and write my own to you, (longer poems, that you collected in a
notebook).
Now, when I come here for this silly little ritual of mine, (one that the gulls
seem to laugh at), after I've purged my soul with this primal scream to the
heavens, and I've moistened this rock with empty tears, I sit and take in the
beauty, and I try hard to appreciate my life and what I'm blessed with, (though
that seems a lie), and I pray and hope and wish like a child, that maybe, just
maybe, if I open my foolish heart to the possibility ...
When I turn around and look at the flat sand behind "our" rock, that there will
be a message scratched in the sand ... a message meant only for me ... a
message of hope and purpose and reason ... or maybe just a message to tell
me I was on your mind ... that you still think of me with love and kindness
and fond reflection ... but the sand is always smooth and untouched and a
cold reminder of reality.
So, I find a stick and scratch ... and then leave our place behind ... and a little
more of you with it.
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