The Lifeguard
by David Simms
She wanted someone to swim with her
or be nearby at least
and so he met her on the dock,
sat at the end of it,
dipped his feet into the soft water
as she swam under a warming morning sun,
under cloud fluffs full of innocence,
her swim cap moving farther, farther from the shore,
a gently steady pace,
an astronaut on a tether out in space.
He thought of yesterday
when he'd plunged in himself
and stroked in record time into a weakened state
(years since any real swimming).
He thought of now:
What if she cramps?
What if the snapping turtle snaps at her out there
and the tether breaks?
He'd never reach her.
Or he would.
And they'd both go under.
And be lamented.
And be praised:
her adventureful life,
his bravery,
no one wiser,
except her in her dying gulp,
that he'd been in over his head,
that he deserved an eternity
under a tidal wave in hell.
BIO: David Simms wrote "The Lifeguard" at a poetry retreat on one of Minnesota's 10,000 lakes in July. He shared the poem with the participants and then the swimmer, to whom he dedicated it, said with much good humor that she didn't expect to be saved, she merely wanted someone there, a witness more or less, in case anything did happen.
Sand, Sun and a Gallon of Tokay
by Sy Roth
Sinfully bright-day memoir--
pearly rays of sunlight
implanting dancing fireflies in the backs of eyes.
Youthful day of October-escape,
a gallon of Tokay sloshing in the back seat;
splashing ocean waves
playing a Chopin medley in the background;
tires whispering on the asphalt a Roy Orbison song.
The top down on the candy-red Chevrolet Impala
the two men were pleased
with their hooky-playing, honky-tonk traipsing.
They stopped to sit on a
sand dune along the side of the ocean,
to drink the red wine to the bottom without fear,
and challenge the sand to tickle the fringes of their faces
and order the wind to whip their hair about their heads in lasso circlets.
Tomorrow would come.
But upon that bank of time
all that was real was the sand, the sun, red Chevrolet
and the gallon of Tokay.
Yesterdays ended in paintings and poems-
paintings a volcanic rush of lava sprays and magma,
poems a love song jouncing along in a silent spring.
Their todays a mish-mash of recollections and sighs.
Bio: SY Roth is a retired school administrator and has finally found the sounds of silence and the time to think whole thoughts. This has led him to find words and the ability to shape them. He has been published in Visceral Uterus, Amulet, BlogNostics, Every Day Poets and The Eloquent Atheist. Recently, he won a poetry contest sponsored by Newsday.
Who
by Gerald Solomon
Far Rockaway, storm swells
at pale sight’s last grey clue.
Thunder in the offing.
A sense of all, all, mere air─
above, down, forwards, inside, through.
You wage your time for a whole─
partials, weak explanations, glare.
Chinese flowers untwist, paper in water.
(In endeared gardens cells fail with their thirst.)
So some have said the works is who.
Seen across our unremitting daylight
their skipping mountain crags are─ who?
A cant that smacks of divine sleight.
Men of cloth have parsed both stars and wars.
Who made the rules for Einstein’s dice has lost…
Right here on this civil beach the ocean-surge
has not deferred to impersonation, only
the suasions of a fanciful moon’s dull weight.
Bio: Gerald Solomon was born in London and studied English Literature at Cambridge University. After a short spell as sales assistant at a bookshop in London's Charing Cross Road he worked as a producer at the BBC. Subsequently becoming engaged in education, he helped found General Studies courses at Hornsey College of Art, and this led eventually to an enjoyable period teaching poetry courses at Middlesex University. He retired early in order to paint and write. His poems have appeared in numerous magazines in the USA and UK as he prepares his first collection. He is married, with four children, and lives in Manhattan.