October 29, 2013

the shadowy spectacular 

How we gathered, singly and in groups, and paused as the sun edged west,

stretching our doppelgängers thin on the sloping beach. I’m certain

some of us were thinking of all that came before this sandy bliss, the rest

of our stories lined up like a set of dominoes. The horizon

beckoned, looking like a dare or a doorway or an exit from the highway

that had taken us this far, and we stood, still as tree trunks,

as the water murmured, “Come” and “Go” with equal emphasis. The day

wasn’t over. Our lives weren’t over. It was beginning to sink in, the shadowy

spectacular of the what-next, and how, of course, it always lay there, poised

on the brink of becoming, waiting for the sun to set so we could see it, too.