I am on vacation, but still in New Jersey… Cape May specifically, it seems to be an annex of Philly these days, I didn’t intend on writing so much, I felt so not inspired, but, I did write, like a homeless weirdo on the beach (oh the looks I got creating my art), but that said… here is what I wrote, tomorrow , a monday, I will be on a beach, some beach, probably remote because I want to hear from the plovers, the kites and the gulls, instead of the dull populace I know… (this will be added to my porch series)

“porch” (vacation version) 10.7.2018

cape may, cusp of columbus day

I come here to get away

and find myself surrounded

by sounds and lights

I can hardly hear the waves crashing

billy joel cover band and conversations,

shadows from car lights through railings flashing

shadows of people that grow and stretch

I’m sitting on a bench on the ocean road

a concrete promenade

across from an official entrance to the beach

a sign orders me I am not allowed, by the town, ordinance

white wood rails cast an L on the ground

and now the cabana bar is wailing some stevie ray vaughn

something I might have chosen

“the sky is falling”

kindle wood wired fences, to protect the dunes

the car lights feel like flashlights, walking up like midnight joggers

older couples walk by –

I wonder, flip flops make a certain pop sound

what will I be when I am older

not too far from now

I am the only one out here alone, writing,

everything else seems inviting and wrapped in reveling

but I remain, trying to concentrate on the waves

the constant surf in the near distance

not the clamor blocking from all directions, distraction

am I selfish, for just wanting the sound

the sound of the ocean crashing, allowing my mind to rest,

there is a breeze, but yet, the plants of the dunes do not move

I suppose they are immune when I am enamored by the move,

a silver mother and golden daughter walk past

at least I imagine they are such, their language in form and my experience spoke to that,

the bike racks are not quite bursting but near full, at night,

the paint and stain on the bench looks quite pristine, woody and iron blue,

even the garbage bins seem clean,

but the din…

that ever present welling of amplified conversation.

If ever a tower of babble there ever was

“porch” 10.7.2018

so how did I wind up here?

sitting alone on a bench

the stir of life all around, a maelstrom

and I am the eye

sitting and observing, all this life

a lifeless eye, closest to the intense

but calmest of all,

life, merry, singing, dancing,

friend, family, lovers,

cheaters, smokers, would be elopers,

detached from all this

tricking my mind, that time is,

time also sweeping me by, and through

sidelined (as if escaped)

but the days peeling away just the same

I question my motives my every move

introspection

I have more than many

certainly more than some

I should rejoice –

but here I am

staring at foreign plants on common sand

these pages moist with the breath of the common sea.