Questions for the Sea

And are there even answers?

What is it about you?

A question I ask

every time I nestle

into sand that shifts

to support my form,

and stare at

the breaking waves

that tumble forth.

Is it your persistence?

As the changing tide lines

vacillate between

retreat and an unfettered

swallowing of the

territory that I call home.

Is it your colours?

The never-fixed tremulous

dance across the colour wheel

as your skin reflects

sparkling endlessness

and is scratched by wind

or rippled by rain.

Is it your expanse?

An unburdened horizon,

save a few dotted ships,

that extends as far as

my perception allows

and brings true meaning

to the word; distance.

Is it your temper?

From languid glass stillness,

enough that a bouncing

flat stone might traverse you

without hindrance,

to a vociferous

force that could

claim cities

without effort.

Is it your secrets?

The cloaked world beneath

where I am not the apex,

but merely a guest among

aliens who breathe liquid,

resisting pressures

that would crush my bones

in places that bend

the familiar.

Is it me?

Am I anthropomorphising

a force of nature that

is just what it is

without labels I assign

to appease and explain

the ebb and flow

of my gut whenever

I pause before you,

oscillating,

as if I were being rocked

in an enormous sea salt cot.

I’m not sure I’ll

have an answer.

For every time

I sit with you,

I am left

with more questions.