I Came by Walter Bjorkman

I came to the sands to forget the hourglass, tiny droplets of coral casting diamond specks of eternity towards the sun.

I came to the dunes to remember the times we laughed, screwed and slept beneath the Van Gogh night skies on the cooling blanket of particles.

I came to the beach to talk of banjo men with Donovan’s Starfish on the Toast, “holding welkes and periwinkles twinkling” in my hand – fully aware they hold me too.

I came to the surf to remember my first one – a blackfish so small my Father could not feel the tug with his calloused work hands, but his young son’s gentle ones could.

I came to it all trying to forget, but remembering, building a raft of driftwood that summer he died in my ninth year, wanting to sail away from reality and onto his seahorse back-rides just one year before, the sands and surf of the beach my playground, not my memoirs.