Beach Tribe

The Poem

There are mornings when the beach belongs to no one.Not empty — never empty —but unpeopled, which is different,which is the gift of a Tuesdaythat forgot to send anyone.

From this distance the pier is small.The red building at its center —one fixed point in a world of horizontal motion,one held note in a song made entirely of color.

One fixed point

I have been coming here for ten years.From under it the pier speaks close —wood and water, the once-a-year light.From here it speaks the longer sentence.The whole thing visible.The pier as it actually is:a structure that stood in the water long enoughto become a world.

There is life crawling all over it.The birds that claimed the railings.The barnacles that claimed the pillars.The creatures that found it the way the lost find anything —by needing a place and finding oneand staying until staying becomes belonging.

Life crawling all over it

The pier didn’t advertise.The pier simply stoodand they cameand it held them without distinction,without asking what they planned to do next.

I am part of this tribe.Not the birds. Not the barnacles.Something in between —the one who comes on the empty mornings,who stands at the distance where the whole thing is visible,who needs what the pier offerswithout being able to name itexcept to say:refuge.

The place that asks nothing and gives everything.

It has stood the test of time.The storms came. The tides came.The years came with everything years bring.

The pier is still here.Still holding the birds, the barnacles,the red building, the once-a-year light,the person on the empty beachwho comes on Tuesdays when nobody else doesand stands at the distance where the whole thing is visibleand feels, for a moment, held.

The color rushes left to right across everything —sky, water, sand —all of it in motion,all of it the frequency of a morningshowing you what it’s made of.

The pier stands in the middle of all that motion.Still.

I am alone on this beach.I am not lonely on this beach.The pier is there. The tribe is there.

And I am standing on the sandat the distance where I can see the whole thing at once —present, patient, still here —

which is, it turns out,
exactly what I came for.