Waves Are Mountains Pushing Us Through Time

(inspired by Michael McClure)

Water lifts me

to my neck, azure water,

Caribbean waves rolling,

a rainbow in the distance,

puffy cumulus clouds around, the rain

somewhere on the horizon,

the rainbow still there,

loved ones coming to greet me—

(at 62 everything is all right. . .)

Matt is here, his smile, his wide laugh, his blue eyes intent,

and his grandmother,

my mother Dorothy, her bright sunburn,

Florence, my aunt, and Thomas too,

on Long Island Sound, I am riding the waves at age 8,

I am 8 on Long Island Sound, the water—

not turquoise, not warm, but yes, buoyant, buoyant,

the sand in my suit, my skin colored pink

like the color in the rainbow, patterns

of salt drying on my skin, and now

a man rides waves next to me,

he could be my Chicago lover, and

I am thinking about Aunt Esther,

how she followed her lover west, changed her name, left her Indiana life,

and Grandma and Grandpa, they never saw

the sea, but they are here,

the others, the recent ones, my friends, writers, teachers,

Gale, Guadalupe, Anny, Bobby—

their exquisite words, not silenced, living, eternal,

their books, my soul,

our souls, the water—

it plumes

up, pushes

me towards shore, bubbles

in my hair and mouth, I am—

I am liquid, I am lifted,

I am swirling spray and foam, we are eddies,

we are swells, we are currents

moving in and

reaching out,

each person, each memory,

each time, they

lift us, they

carry us, they hold us,

their salt drying

on our skin—