elizabethlevett

Your sea is so great, and my boat is so small.

Valella. You find them washed up on the beach after low tide.

Sometimes entire armadas —

 tiny, exquisite jellyfish, indigo on the base,

and their delicate sails – transparent

with just a touch of aqua.

Beautiful and complete and

so vulnerable.

They float with such perfection – masterful surfers,

perfect specimens of biological engineering —

but blown by the winds,

surviving at the pleasure of powerful tides.

I used to see you as so confident –

happy-go-lucky, devil-may-care, the world

on a string,

somehow safe from the inevitable storms of life.

I don’t believe I ever understood you.

But I saw you just now up close.

I saw your hopeful heart and the parts of you

where the wind had snuck in

and knocked everything around.

I saw where you’ve been unsure and alone.

We walked on the beach and told stories.

We found by-the-wind sailors and scooped them

onto sand dollars

to ferry them back into the waves.

Then I saw you in a dream.

You wanted me to see that you’ve felt lost, adrift, at times.

But I loved seeing you all the same.

You played me some music you liked

and you told me about your friends.

I played you some songs of mine and hoped you’d like them.

At first, I didn’t realize it was you and so

I asked your name.

“Sailor,” is what you said.

I promised you that someday someone

would see your heart and

scoop you up.

Someone who could match

all the light in your eyes.