Black to the Beach

I wore black to the beach

in deep belief

it helped me to blend in

it’s funny now,

the things I thought

I’d safely hide within

old Ocean Drive

was even then

closed down but closed alive

the windows to the buildings

stared in witness to my life

Kid, it’s okay.

It’s okay to work within the framework you’ve got at the time. It’s okay if it’s nothing more than a busted collage of self-protective superstition and song lyrics by white men you’ll denounce later in life. Who cares? Why would you know any better? The first ten years of school are just a bunch of lessons about what men did and why you should too. Honestly, where you’re expected to learn about a single other thing is anyone’s guess.

Never mind that you’re surviving, that you live with someone who isn’t your father—but whom you’re allegedly lucky to have. Never mind that they’ll tell you that as long as live, despite any compelling evidence to the contrary. It’ll take you twenty more years to nail down what actually happened there—and frankly, that’s on the early side of things. Give yourself a break.

You’ll go back to the beach a hundred times in your life. Not to that beach, no. That beach is frozen in time like those flowers and sprigs of mint that end up in the ice cubes of fancy people. Forget about it. Or don’t. You can write about it as long as you like. You earned the ink.

(You could wrap it all up with ink and the color black and really win the day here, but you won’t. You’re done wrapping things up for other people’s comfort and good for you. A little discomfort never hurt anyone, not really. Sometimes things just end.)