Tides too low for sustenance,
winds filled with decay,
blown in from the shore,
the stench lifts and dissipates
like fog.
The sun then overpowers.
Waves trickle in, helpless and effete,
barely worthy of the sea.
I walk in peace,
my strides cycling like the tides.
In hours the waters will rise,
the scent will shift to salts,
the sandbars will sink, invisible.
The cycle will begin again.
By then, I’ll have put up my feet,
soothed my aching calves,
cradled a cocktail.
I’ll have exhaled over the porch,
south to the Gulf,
my breath lilting toward the waves,
as feeble as those ripples that dimmed
away in the sand,
mere foam, dissolved in twilight’s hush.
This vague dissolution on the shore
gives way as the sea
gathers itself again to rush inland,
opening my eyes to the coming morning,
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