Even the earth, sometimes the sea
08/06/2008 06:42 a.m.


In time with the sea's wild blue voice, waves accuse the barriers. Double-chinned clouds lean over like distant, short-sighted neighbors. Light drowns onthe surface in shattered, alarming, regal globules; a snorkler patterns himself on a mole, tunnelling to Cabbage Tree Bay. A man vanishes off the point - another from the bench below mine, with his book. Their clothes are black as rocks, their light thoughts obscured. I write as though I can (escape) but the snorkler's strokes bore past again. Studying the small tree under which I am seated (the top of my head almost touching the lowest leaves), how its shadow has left a palm reading, over which it peers.

I want to lie about these things even more than I want to tell the truth. What does this make me?