Waimea
by Hannah Lum
I stood barefoot at the top
of (not just any) rock I’d climbed
and from the forty, or maybe forty-three feet up
I looked down to the bottom of the sea,
so close but simultaneously so far
out of my reach, without my willingly
plunging towards the possibility
(perhaps) of my demise.
Patterns of winds
and waves and currents would determine
my defeat, or contrarily my welcoming
back onto the surface of the earth.
Having never stared death in the face
in such a way involving beauty and
the heartful height of grace,
I was both unsure and brave –
what finally led me to brace myself
against that jagged outcrop,
facing downwards where it looked to be
a human’s final drop, was the defiance
you unwittingly instilled in me:
I will not be defeated
by something insignificant
and so small as these feelings
unrequited. The elements, instead,
may choose to take me,
quite appropriately.
And so I lept,
and felt the bursting of the ocean on all sides of me,
and in milliseconds wondered
what would then become of me – if I’d ever
rise again to daylight –
but before I could finish the thought,
the water’s current brought me up above,
I found my feet could even touch, and I breached
the shore with just the slightest reach.
When I arrived there, I knew confidently
that I would not need you anymore.
But now,
looking back,
in spite of crashing into oceans and
reeling bodily off cliffs,
nothing I will ever do will ever let me
to let go completely, to forget you
and to never know, and miss
the depth of you, the beauty
you contain, the wish
inside your eyes
I wished I always knew
but somehow
never could.
of (not just any) rock I’d climbed
and from the forty, or maybe forty-three feet up
I looked down to the bottom of the sea,
so close but simultaneously so far
out of my reach, without my willingly
plunging towards the possibility
(perhaps) of my demise.
Patterns of winds
and waves and currents would determine
my defeat, or contrarily my welcoming
back onto the surface of the earth.
Having never stared death in the face
in such a way involving beauty and
the heartful height of grace,
I was both unsure and brave –
what finally led me to brace myself
against that jagged outcrop,
facing downwards where it looked to be
a human’s final drop, was the defiance
you unwittingly instilled in me:
I will not be defeated
by something insignificant
and so small as these feelings
unrequited. The elements, instead,
may choose to take me,
quite appropriately.
And so I lept,
and felt the bursting of the ocean on all sides of me,
and in milliseconds wondered
what would then become of me – if I’d ever
rise again to daylight –
but before I could finish the thought,
the water’s current brought me up above,
I found my feet could even touch, and I breached
the shore with just the slightest reach.
When I arrived there, I knew confidently
that I would not need you anymore.
But now,
looking back,
in spite of crashing into oceans and
reeling bodily off cliffs,
nothing I will ever do will ever let me
to let go completely, to forget you
and to never know, and miss
the depth of you, the beauty
you contain, the wish
inside your eyes
I wished I always knew
but somehow
never could.