Smiling because we were here and we were happy
and a miscellany of other things that you feel next to the sea
exhilaration, wholeness, subconscious relief at the vast reminder of our individual insignificance
vexation at the wasps.
How did you feel, next to the sea? When you were young?
The ocean. The sea.
Pulling you to the shore to giggle at its twinkling expanse.
The ocean. The sea.
It was different. Yes? No? Sí.
Inside that shell
on that shelf
in her house
is the exact sound I heard at the beach I burnt my soles on in a 1980s August.
Still young enough to feel most things in black and white.
Still small enough to squat for pebbles and lift them like trophies.
Driving to the place where the land fell away to nothing
a journey to the end of the earth, always feeling like a journey to the beginning.
Land giving way to nothing
nothing but liquid and shimmer and crash
We could not drink it, or wash the salt from our skin
but we could build small fortresses against it and scream at the biting thrill of its touch.
There was one I loved who spoke only of the “ocean”
we never swam together.
Where is this English ocean, surfer dude? Take me there.
Really I loved to hear him say this word that matched his eyes. His cadence carried the ferocity and calmness in 2 syllables, like the surf.
Ocean.
A word of intensity describing something deep, a depth that he expressed only in type or the inky blue of the words in the cards he sent each year
on the 14th day of February.
We never swam together.
How does it feel? Next to the sea? On a hot day?
Fortresses cute and futile, coquettishly lined up in faux battle against the fury of the tide,
waiting to be taken.
the sun throwing flames to the skin.
Calm
and yet
air heavy with the scent of intense longing for an unknown thing.
And something else, hot dust.
Hot dust and a buoyant yearning.
Perhaps that is the longing
to be the dust again
not for neglect of life
but to return home after a long day.
Seaside holidays with your parents.
They take pictures of you on the beach
because you’re tiny, shiny and new, and precious.
“All photographs are memento mori”. Sontag said so and I feel that she’s right.
Now you take pictures of yourself and the trees in much the same way.
Cerulean? Turquoise? Azure?
If they ask your favourite colour, they’re really making notes on the zest of your heart.
Childhood passes and we recognise the power and the vastness of the sea
it has a sinister side.
This is not a quote.
“Add sinister to any sentence and it will make the subject sinister”. This is a quote, I have always said so and I feel that I’m right.
We cannot think of the sea in shallow terms. It will engulf us all one day.
We were there and we were happy.
We didn’t want reminders of our insignificance that day however comforting.
So we were there
reclining next to a cyan lido of faded beauty, talking of family and of past loves, sharing oil and sordid tales
the sea occasionally crashing over the walls of the pool, reminding us of our insignificance regardless.
Not too far from the sea, mind you.
How do you feel? Next to the sea?
Land giving way to nothing
a nothing you can float on
a nothing full of something
a something you can fall through
We cannot think of the sea in shallow terms.
Further text here
