Portuguese Man o' War

Sunrise and already the water is being seared with a glow as if under a grill. You can feel the heat building in the morning air, the sand still warm from yesterday. The tide has left the creature stranded on the beach, its frilled sail glistening and rigged with blue tentacles clumped menacingly beside its motionless body. The sun will soon cook it to a dried out bladder. This drifting marvel of murder is now no more than sea phlegm coughed up on the crest of a wave. It looks so pitiful. And yet it still has the power to inflict a painful sting. Venom waits for one last desperate chance to snare some poor careless prey. My fingers seem possessed with a will to pick it up to see how it feels without being stung. I hover somewhere between head and hand, stranded by indecision. Footnote This is one of a series of poems that have the shoreline as the backdrop for the exploration of meaning in things washed up on the beach or in the experience of being in the moment. Paul