Inlet

Fog slow-dances over the inlet until water and air waltz together. My ears are muffled in the dawn mizzle. Grebes and Coots colonize this tributary, gulls just visit, as I do. A person could row out to the ocean from here, but the thick haze might take a soul or lose a body then it would be caught between two worlds. Later sitting on the cabin porch, mind wondering why the skiff did not head out to the coastal waves at least as far as any swimmer might go, but the answer is clear; keeping this ageing body safe, that’s all that matters now.