A half moon in Lamu
The hot sun climbs fast
From darker blue to lighter blue
And the darkness suddenly dissipates;
Water in
Water out
The wind blows incessantly
Not too slow, not too fast
Sufficient to undress you;
Water comes in
Water goes out
The stars so plentiful,
So tiny yet so big,
So far away and so bright,
They will make you feel small,
And not one, not two,
But three whole galaxies
Making you face your own insignificance;
And the water comes in
And the water goes out
Until for one night only,
One out of twenty-eight,
The Moon and the Sun
Meet,
melt,
unite,
Day and night,
Silver and gold;
And the water comes in even closer
And the water goes out even further
Then the horizon:
Finer line amongst vastest blues,
Spirit, earth, water, fire, air,
Big mouth that swallows
The sun, the moon, the stars, the self;
And the water comes in
And the water goes out
And you aimlessly flow
In the soft lulling of the waves
In the overwhelming strength of the current
Water comes in
Water goes out
Until finally you are washed away to the shore,
A long forgotten plastic biro
With nothing left to say,
With nothing left to learn
A plastic top with no more water to hold,
With no message to contain,
With no bottle to cap,
A beautiful smooth old piece of driftwood,
From some distant lush shore,
Bare, naked, exposed,
Half buried in the sand,
Under the fearsome Lamu Sun.
Water in
Water out.
A.M.B
January 2018
