I came to the beach to be alone.

My feet left lonely footprints in the sand,
and the sand left lonely sandprints in my feet.

To me, these patterns look tiny, like freckles or stars,
but if I were small, even smaller than sand,
they would be the crators on the moon, the grand canyon, the great lakes,
and they would make me feel so small, as I looked out over their emptiness.

But I am human, and I watch, instead,
the rain clouds blossom above me,
like a bouquet of faces,
like the family submerged in surf,
the grandmother's turquoise t-shirt washed into watercolors,
a perfect rendering of sea and sky.

Further down the people become silhouettes,
statues dedicated to the muses of finding seashells, of wandering till getting lost, of leaving footprints in the sand,
gray monuments reminding me I am not alone.
I watch them fade into the shadowed, hallowed place where earth meets sky,
the gap in the atmosphere where the universe was born, and is reborn every moment,
where lonely statues evaporate like seas, like dreams, like memories,
as words bloom in the air
like clouds of rain.

Labels: By Ana