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It’s been awhile, but I finally feel words moving around inside me again, trying to make their way out into the world. So here is a new poem at last.

high tide

it comes in with the waking,
like all the detritus of the sea,
pulled and pushed from blue depths,
tossed and turned along on the tide,
carried mile upon mile,
to arrive broken on my shore.

there seaweed rots in sunshine,
pale shells get crushed to sand,
driftwood dries, from parts unknown,
and crabs and seabirds come
to take their fill from what remains,
what once was bright and living.

so end all the fragile dreams,
plans and pleasures counted on,
the mistakes and failures, big and small,
all equals now, churned together,
dredged up and left awash,
to remind or regret once more.

even an ocean must unburden itself,
as a human heart is wont to do,
gather up and discard the waste,
its lost hopes, unwanted memories,
silent questions and unanswered prayers,
to be rid of them finally, for good.

but more and more will come,
since an ocean has no end,
a tide moving always in and out,
on and on, unseen currents flowing,
bringing back sometimes
what I believed already long gone.

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Listen to this poem read aloud here: