Jaws Just Turned Fifty
The salty wind tans my face, smile
for miles of shoreline. My feet ecstatic
to dip and go into the ebb and flow.
I didn’t know it then, how time flies;
so glad, so free, so liberating. Just
a child running into Melbourne arms.
She’s nine, this person I remember.
I only remember pure happiness.
It is addressed E V E R Y time
I hear the swoosh, feel hot sun,
smell the coconut air. N E V E R
afraid of sharks, my cousins, lovingly
warned me of. I couldn’t have cared less.
All the foamy joy of the tides lifting me
higher and higher into ecstasy. Dance
of fluidity. Later, I’d watch Jaws, but
not for another five years…fearless,
collecting shells; Auntie Elaine still
living, telling me to glue onto velvet
Florida F O R E V E R keepsakes.
My granddaughters, would move
and swim in this space, I occupied
so many years before. I stand
knee deep, sandals kicked off,
while my daughter, and hers,
wait at the car. You couldn’t keep
me from this cherry picked memory.
The beachy wind in my face. Miles
and miles of shoreline. Coconut
and salt, swooshing of ebb and flow.
Jaws just turned fifty and I’m still
riding the highs of possibilities.
Copyright ©
Kim Rodrigues
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