Choose To Die
Holiday time.
You finally get away
You hired a villa across the road
From an estuary beach
With gentle rolling waves
No more than a foot and a half
That day, you, your wife
And your 2 young children
Just play in the sand
Run up and down
Collecting sea shells
And other mementos
The weather is just great
Maybe the sea breeze is
A tad cool for getting in the water
Next morning is picture perfect
North easterly pushes the waves
To two and a half foot
Great for kids
On the boogie board
Late morning the sun
Heats up enough
For getting in
Amongst it
You take you kids out
One by one
And push them off
On the board
To ride the waves
They are breaking nicely
But out a bit further
Than usual
You take your son out
Beyond the break
And wait for
The next set
You are about 200
Meters from shore
Standing in water nearly
Up to your neck
Your son on the board
Waiting for a wave
The shark appears
From nowhere and
Takes a chunk out
Of the board
You grab your son
Hold him up
Panic wants to set in
Then you see two more fins
Coming towards you
They taught you to
Stand your ground
Hit the shark with something
No sudden moves
Don’t panic
What are your options here
If the sharks decide to
Attack, you die
Your son can’t swim
So he dies as well
You could throw him
To the sharks
And you might survive
Or you might not
You could recover the board
Now about 10 meters away
Put your son on a wave
And you could distract
The sharks and
Probably get eaten
But your son might live
Then you realise
The other two fins
Belong to dolphins
They were protecting you from
The shark
You make it back to shore
With your son
Where your wife
And daughter are
Beside themselves
Having witnessed
All that.
You say
I would have chosen
To die
No buts about it.
Copyright © Uwe Stroh | Year Posted 2018
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