A DREAMER IN A REALM OF SHADOWS
By Cordelia San


Coming over the dune, gray sand, soft and warm
Looking back at a familiar road,
And forward at the new.
I’ve had a picture of this beach I see now
A healthy length of sand to the water
The bell ringing over the sounds
An ice-cream bell.

Waves tumbling over themselves
Like large swishes of town chatter,
splashed and garbled in barrels of rolling water.
A million voices and lives alive under the sea.
The billows and swells, always trying to get ahead
Sinking. Drowning. Lifting.
Always everywhere at once

Gemstone froth, amber pools just beneath the surface
And a million beguiling blues, and purples and silver
Silver everywhere
Like stardust tiptoed across the water
That was what my picture showed me
A memory

The sun warming my skin 
A blanket and lullaby, and my eyes closed of their own accord
Listening to the symphony of the sea

And now, two summers later
The ocean is flat
The beach is hollow, the sand all carved away
Briny licking it still, 
Hungry
Salty, like I stuffed my nose with seaweed
Sucking bodies into its underworld. Vain.
And the image from my mind
Keeps me wishing I could go back in time.
 

—
Copyright © 2020 by Cordelia San

A Dreamer in a Realm of Shadows | By Cordelia San

Her Words is a writing and performance program for teen girls and gender nonconforming youth based in Morristown, New Jersey.