Beach Bodies

We were at the beach once, when
A runner-by, had yelled out
Get going, you fat brown pig.

I had laughed in response, noticing

His eyes caught behind a shade of
Dark glasses, his pale white skin baked
Into a wrap of leathery brown.

I had stared at the sky afterward,

And had noticed the ocean’s deep blue wrinkles,
Open and crack and disappear. And had felt so small then,
Staring at the blue bodies’ widths,
Felt so little, so insignificant, that I had cried quietly
Into the red bucket with which we had made
Sand castles, cupolas, and fragile minarets.

Later, I would dip my fingers into the colorless puddles

Of confusion, feeling its salinity sucked into my palm,
And inhale sounds of the saxophone they had left behind
An hour before the bonfire.

Little had I known then, how, years later,

Six pointed words would ring in my ears,
Like an automatic response, well-rehearsed,
Every time you’d ask, Want to go to the beach, Tom?
Want to go to the beach? Leading me, instead, into
A cool, dark corner, away from the mockery of sunlight.