Dan Brady and I walked out to Ocean Beach. We had both written a poem after a good lunch at the Beachside Cafe. After climbing up a small dune we could see it was low tide. A stretch of sand was cleanly swept, smooth and glistening. Little white sand dollars here and there, most of them broken. Dan wanted to walk to the water’s edge, but the bottom of one of my boots was slashed and I didn’t want to risk it getting wet. We found a piece of wood on a rock, large enough for us to sit down.
Fresh air and quietude. Two crows stood nearby, pecking the sand. We read our poems to each other, surprised that we had a similar title that was inspired by an old Irish guy rambling next to us as we tried to write. A man walked by with his dog, picking up pieces of garbage in the sand. “You can do that after you retire,” I said to Dan. But he said he just wanted to sit on a beach chair and doze away. Oh…and also to build a bonfire.
The city and all its busyness behind us, there was peace in the moment.
