Two bodies

The ocean drifts at my hips
then back
an undercurrent hungry
for my suit.
Water pulls his palms over unshaved sticks
licks the sweat
from my cool melon legs.
I feel him in and out of my toes
watch the pool of me – metallic sun screened skin –
bob like sheets
on his wide black body.

Pelicans dip
in and out over waves
like spotted pieces of laundry
white linen breasts clean. Wings
soft and dirty.
I lick the salt around the rim of our mouths
dive in
thirst full
my woman body. While

virgins splash past the breaks
ballooning their breasts together
they blush around sandbars at his back, his shoulders
I burn flat-breasted
in the water.

When Ella Fitzgerald
slips me notes in the background
Black Coffee wafts through the beach house

Love’s a hand-me-down brew
I’ll never know a Sun-
day
In this week-
day room

I know
this
won’t last forever.

Wash dishes,
slice peppers
make breakfast for the boys
waking up at odd-angled hours.
This morning I rose alone
peering from the highest point of the house.
I could see the ocean
over calico shingles, white-salted roofs
his swift moving ribs still lapping the sand
his wet tongue, his hands
I felt the mosaic of sand
in my hair
grainy roots under nails
white
hot
seeds. We drifted once,
exchanged our matter
between two willing bodies.
His skin rose and glistened, tossed like jewels,
beckoning this woman
back