years in the making i am skeptical to accept the role as
king of this underwater castle.

a place where the divers and submarines alike insist on anchoring away
too soon
before their hearts have a fair chance to grow to the surface.

it’s time for a change.
the time has come to get out the cameras and capture moments.



there is something scattered
romantic and lost about an underwater photo
of the girl or guy who last spoke to you about
what could happen next between us.

fully clothed and soaked to death,
as the hesitant captain of this coral reef i insist
on less coming up for air.

i insist on everyone holding their breath longer
for that which they’ve always wanted

and no one gets to settle like sand.

for the state of the economy, we will take days and full weeks
searching the ocean floor for ship wrecks
only to find fossils of the difficult memories we’ve buried deepest within ourselves.

golden treasure has nothing to do with coins, but the most valuable things
are the mutual feelings we’ll discover
that we’ve had for our childhood friends who never knew.

we can no longer go about with our metal detectors just to make
small scratches on each other’s iron lungs.


remember, this is what we’ve all been dreaming about

afterall, we chose the storm and not the shore,
and that is why we’re here.

as the seacaptain of this sunken vessel, this small aquatic village we call home,
i can no longer accept shallow-end swimming from the careful ones
as i will constantly remind you all that we only live once,
and who knows when we might get rescued by the sea’s drying up.
our clothes, skins and throats parched.
the time to live is now.

as champion of these 20,000 leagues, i won’t allow the end of time to
swallow us up in uv rays before we’ve tested our strength against the
big sharks that we all used to watch on the discovery channel.

and if its the english channel we’re beneath, we’ll snorkel in british accents
and embrace motionless thru the dark nights to brave the cool water at such a
chillling latitude.


citizens, ladies and gentlemen, this is the perfect time to capture that mythological catch.
this is the right time to come out of your shells and feel for the first time
since the last time you took a dive.

the entire world is outside
you have to go out there and take it
you have to shut your brainwaves off and turn on your heart.

the entire world is outside,
you might die, you will fully live
but you have to try.

08/22/2009

Author's Note: today is never opposite day. read Winning with you Underwater now. that's the prequel. mmm...

Posted on 08/22/2009
Copyright © 2024 Steven Kenworthy