We spent our summers in Maine:
you to write books of poetry,
me to swim in the Atlantic.
Sometimes, you joined me in the ocean,
and we would splash each other with
our tears,
watching as they disappeared into the sea.
They were tears we shed because we
no longer wanted to see the world.
And secretly,
we no longer wanted to see each other.
We were foolish enough to think that tears could blind us.
I remember standing in the Atlantic Ocean,
reluctantly holding hands,
our fingers pruned,
covered in bumps and wrinkles,
reminding us of the contour map
that hung in our rented house inhabited by
a lobster man.
At night, we would sit on the porch of
that house
and you told me stories of the stars –
strangers you wanted to meet, but
never could;
strangers you wanted to talk to more
than you wanted to talk to me.
But I told you stories of sea creatures,
ones I knew,
because while you wrote your poems,
I made friends with fish.
It was there that you left me.
You said you wanted to spend more time with your poetry.
But really,
we had been drowning underneath the
burden of our relationship for years.
You leaving me,
me leaving you –
it was inevitable.
So I fled to the Atlantic Ocean,
and it was the fish,
my friends,
who watched my tears disappear into the
sea instead of you.
And it was the fish,
my friends,
who told me stories of lost lobsters and
forgotten crabs instead of you,
telling me stories of stars whom you had
never met.