She crawls up the beach
Fistful of sand
By fistful of sand
Dress caught up in the water
Tides rolling in
Salt on her skin
Beleaguered fear that it's already too late
That he's gone
And that he took his picnic basket
With him
She's a heroine of the French cinema
And sweeping orchestrations
Will underscore her lost love
Provided he is, in fact, lost
But first she has to climb up the beach
And it feels like that
Like something one has to climb
A mountain of sand and castles and bright red blankets
With slowly burning women on them
- Have you seen him?
He's in the weeds
- Have you seen him?
He's behind the dunes
- Have you seen him?
You can't see him
He's invisible
Say the slowly burning women
Somewhere, you think
He's drinking pink drinks
Through clear straws
With other women
All of them wearing big hats
With far, wide brims
And scarves around their necks to spite the temperature
You'll kill him when you find him, you tell yourself
Even though every time you find him
You're so relieved, you go quiet
And let him get mad at you instead
Asking where you've been
And why it took you so long to show up
You only make it halfway up the beach
Before you collapse
And say a little prayer before you do
That he'll stumble across you
As he sometimes does
Instead, tiny lost children find you
And roll you back into the ocean
Thinking you're some sort of fish
Or maybe even a shark
They're wrong,
But you float anyway
Back to another harbor, another beach
You try to swim back to him
But the ocean won't have it
Now, says the sea, it's time to let go
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