The
black Atlantic reaches
I
arch my back across the clammy sand
arranging
my fashionable suit
publicly
across my ribs.
The
summer people have all gone.
Mother
is out up to her neck
in
swells she takes straight on,
arms
up and out.
Her
grey face floats
above
the waves
she
wears like loose robes
falling
from her shoulders
around
her shrinking form.
“Come
in, come in,” she calls.
She
waves her fingers like ruffled handkerchiefs
above
the breakers.
I
imagine she is drifting
beyond
the breakwater
where
icebergs already crystallize
and
I cannot swim.
(I
have never loved a sea
that
knocks me down
and
fills my mouth with sand,
turning
my toes the color of dead flesh.)
“Come
in, come in,” she calls.
“The
water’s warm.”
I
do as I am told.
The
water grabs my crotch
like
a frozen hand.
On
tiptoe I bob
toward
her like a timid child
afraid
to wet my fingers.
Reaching
out to grab them,
she
rises and she falls
pulling
me toward her
where
I cannot touch the bottom.
Beach
noises fade.
We
ride the thrusts of waves
like
willing virgins
over
the edge
bravely into the center
of everything dark
everything cold.