Same stone pier.
Same circumstances.
Same wooden bench.
Same haircut.
Twenty years later,
still sitting here,
waiting on the storm surge.
Thought I could get away,
but all the airports
in the world,
just led me back here.
The world is a globe.
They say,
if you run far enough,
you end where you began.
I watch the grey waves
crash along the beach
and in the roar
I hear voices
that once made promises.
They’re broken just the same,
sucked back out to sea.
A never ending cycle
of absence and injury.
I remember saying
I’d never come back here.
Thought I had run
far enough
to outpace my pain,
but here I am,
staring at that
rolling, grey sky,
just feeling those first
few drops of rain.
Will the storm break me?
Will it take me away?
The wind responds
by blowing sea spray
high into the air,
as if to say,
“I’m waiting.”
I am not the man I was
the last time I faced the storm.
I’ve seen a few more
since then.
My skin is thick,
and my coat is warm.
Thunder rumbles
our there, in the distance,
as the clouds catch the Sun
and the sky darkens.
Soon,
the waves will reach this bench,
where I sit now.
But I will not be here.
I have decided
there are other storms,
ones less predestined,
that need observing.
One last breath,
of that violent
sea spray air.
It seems,
that the storm comes
for everyone.
HG – 2021