I want to show you the beach
that has been with me since I was in utero.
Now I carry it inside me in my turn:
the rocks, the barnacles with their
fronds and sharp edges,
the shards of bathroom tile and blackboard,
the mud and grabbing kelp and broken shells,
the living sand dollars and starfish and crabs.
I too have sharp edges,
have fronds that float in the current
and reach for your ankles;
I too have living things on my shores.
I learned here how to hold all of this,
how to lean over the water like the willow,
how to grow in the cracks,
like grass in the bulkhead, how
to hold on like a limpet,
how to come and go with the tide.
I can feel your footprints in the mud inside me.
They'll wash away when the tide comes in,
but you'll walk here again.
Water changes everything,
but the rocks remember glaciers
and the beach inside me will remember
the shape of your toes.

© 2022 Devin Miller