selfish, ungrateful
manipulative, greedy
inconsiderate woman

the sea is a selfish midwife
this poem comes to me, as he
is saying something else

her puckered source of salt draws out
like purgatory the glistening thread
of all my mouthy, breezy sins

her crashing whites are drawing nearer
and bringing forth a warmer roaring
her blues will dominate the world-under

even the maskmakers handsome face
with dancing with her distance cant compete
none other would appear

(instinctively my husband takes
out the surfboard and somehow my eyes
are lost between breakers

(now the man has set up a beach office
collecting pieces of coral and driftwood
for future homes for orchids

(as he is practicing a bamboo flute
i notice his wild and silvery hair
his carving arms, his shoulders framed with care

(his body, copper-brown in the dappled shade
it could be mine and not too far away
in udeng and a black sarung . . . )

but the point of being at the sea
is being at the sea, so i give up
i leave my towel and my things behind

and i rush into her jade-blue embrace
its just me, bare and pink under the sun
and all of me belongs to her

until he follows me into the waves
where he receives
whats his


//

and somehow its (conspicuously) fitting
O Critias
(for) him(self) to be such
at least being of yalls house

but
he said
(he) is perfectly beautiful and good
too (in) these (things)

πρέπει δέ που
ὦ Κριτία
τοιοῦτον αὐτὸν εἶναι
τῆς γε ὑμετέρας ὄντα οἰκίας

ἀλλ᾽
ἔφη
πάνυ καλὸς καὶ ἀγαθός ἐστιν καὶ ταῦτα

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