imperfect joy

grainy beneath

white round

and time round

battered into shards

piercing for universal reminders

all wide long

curving

moving mounts farther out still  

evening hadn’t yet approached nor had this been

a perfect day, although there was joy in it still

the woman with cigarettes and coral lips

the young man sitting by the entrance, his tousled hair

a girl with the skin, she thought, of a giraffe

none of us happy although joy to the day still

I placed my hands beneath his arms and we walked

clear translucent
warm, always brackish in these parts

and rows of grapevines heavy with fruit:

there’s no joy taking things for granted.

for a while I could find the indentation of my footsteps

then my toes started kicking up dust

startlingly beautiful, a perfect disk approaching the horizon

swimming back to a metre and a half standing

but sometimes the sea tried to bring me to my knees

The sea can be funny that way. Thalassa, I like her.

as I was saying, some things are heartbreakingly beautiful

the night breeze arrived, it knocked the salt off my gums,

that kind of breeze.

I’ll wait as long as it takes

waiting slowly —  slowly obscured the brilliant orange

the solitary dot near the cloud-empty horizon

but wondrous our earth
apart at red green spectrum 

but luminous, and myself alight

sliding below the line of the horizon

to a sunrise

my lost love, my love