Just because you love the ocean doesn't mean you have to drown in it.

Twilight bleeds across the jagged coastline,

Waves churning like restless memories,

Salt-worn cliffs stand witness to the struggle

Between passion and preservation.

Your love is a tide pool contained, yet alive,

Reflecting sky and stone in its fragile mirror,

Each ripple a testament to boundaries

Drawn softly but firmly between devotion and surrender.

The horizon whispers ancient warnings:

Admiration is not submission,

Love is not drowning, but swimming

With purpose, with breath, with choice.

Granite shoulders of the shore

Hold back the hungry waters,

Showing how one can embrace beauty

Without being consumed by its wildness.

You can trace the ocean's outline

Without becoming its sacrifice,

Can stand ankle-deep in its vastness

And still keep your own shape intact.

Let the waves touch you but not claim you,

Let the salt sing but not silence you,

For loving something deeply

Does not mean losing yourself

In its infinite depths.