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Buoyant

The sky rumbles black on the horizon

but above me it’s clear blue.  The water playfully

pushes me back and forth, up and down.  I float

where the waves have not found form,

where the sand lies still.

When we were little I’d tell my brother,

“Don’t tease the sea, she always comes out on top!”

But he’d shake his little booty, tempting the calm, until

without warning water’d roll over him, and he’d

come up sputtering salt and laughter.

Lightning stabs distant islands, but I dive

beneath sunlit waters, chasing crabs and fish.

I surface to breathe, pull kelp from my hair,

and discretely dislodge sand from

certain sensitive areas.

Every summer we’d kick mud in the shallows, bury

each other in heavy sand laced with purple, pink, and white shells.

For hours my sister and I’d scour the beach for treasure

while our brother stole our desserts.

The storm smothers the sun, chilling my skin.

The river in the sky spits in my face, but I plant my feet

in the sand, knowing the wind blows harder high in the air

and soon the sun will be free to warm me again.

-Ashley Rae Curran