Rainswimming

The grey day
met me with main,
romantic acceptation
and I was happy
to wade in the earthwater
as skywater hit my bare chest,
pelted in my eyelids,
soaked in my beard,
and made the ocean around me
look like an upsidedown, dripping,
world of grieving peaceful splendor.

The fresh inlet was empty.
especially in the pro-lapse of my heart,
except for the fisherman
down by the other horizon,
who didn't care about me or much,
for I am just a lazy lunatic
floating on by
in the current coughed up
by the welcomed weather.

An overcast dusk
and a lightning-less storm
makes for a better fishing
and introspection,
at least that's how Hemingway
once described it to me,
so many years ago
in the pages of one of his sea books;
maybe it was To Have and Have Not.

Thirty or so minutes
felt like a waterbed lifetime,
and with a thunder alarm clock,
I emerged with some needed peace,
noticing the fishermen were gone,
and the moon was laughing,
reassuring me that this is
how to meditate and measure
one's life, by swimming below
and up above.

That night, I made coffee,
watched the storm grow stronger
and come to a difficult decision,
one that I would save for another day,
keeping it in my back pocket,
while just enjoying the quietness
of storm and inner study,
thanking the good-natured earth
for helping me figure it out.