There were 20 minutes when no one was there.
Not on the beach.
Not in the water.
Not across the pond.

I strip down in an instant
and dive into the September waters
without compassion
and daringly continue out
toward our town
center–
the altar of summer.

I lift myself onto the dock
and lie there
under the sun,
one middle-aged breast
deflating to each side.
No virgin offering
to this lasting day of summer.

And before I hear a car door slam
or the crunch of a stick underfoot,
I slip off the dock
and make my way back through the cool water to the shore.

I wrap myself in a towel,
and stand at the water’s edge
to let the sun kiss my face,
in communion with the stillness
of water
of Everything.

Just then, a head appears,
out of the soft ripples I left behind.
It’s the one we’ve watched grow from a chick on his mother’s back
to being left behind by the mating pair to come of age on his own.

The loon and I regard one another,
and then he dives under the water again,
and I sit down with a book.

Russ and Andi appear
in their beach chairs
behind me
in the grass.

And together
we hold the silence
of the eternal moment…
of this summer day

Until we’re startled by a flock of geese
who lift from the banks
and swoop across our view,
and circle the pond
and rise over the mountains

Heading south.

~