goats and boats

I see them standing at the formal gates of their colleges. I see my father standing out under the ochre sandstone arch, the red tiles glinting like bent plates of blood behind his head. I see my mother with a few light books at her hip, standing at the pillar made of tiny bricks with the wrought-iron gates still open behind her, it's sword-tips black in May air. They are about to graduate. They are about to get married. They are kids. They are dumb. All they know is they are innocent, they would never hurt anybody. I want to go up to them and say "Stop, don't do it. She's the wrong women, he's the wrong man. You are going to do things you cannot imagine you would ever do. You are going to do bad things to children. Your going to suffer in many way you haven't heard of. You are going to want to die." I want to go up to them there in the late May sunlight and say it. But i don't do it, I want to live. I take them up like the male and female paper dolls and bang them together at the hips like chips of flint, as if to strike sparks from them. I say, "Do what you are going to do and I will tell about it"

The sea's only gifts are harsh blows, and occasionally the chance to feel strong. Now I don't know much about the sea, but I do know that that's the way it is here. And I also know how important it is in life not necessarily to be strong but to feel strong. To measure yourself at least once. To find yourself at least once in the most ancient of human conditions. Facing the blind death stone alone, with nothing to help you but your hands and your own head.