Let The Sea, Lift Me Up.

Over the last two days,
I have lost myself in the exercise of fishing.
I have lived on the water now for almost ten months;
and I have had yet to drop a line,
into the water,
that is my backyard.

I have studied
this vast blue and black vista at great length.
I have acquired nautical maps.
I have tracked the ebb and flow of the tide,
in relation to the passing stars above.
I have spent hours photographing
it's never ending change and flux.
I have endured and revelled
in storms of unimaginable strength.
I have watched as ice crept in,
and turned the all of Old Road Bay
into a sheet of mottled glass.
I have seen much change,
while I have just stayed
the sad same me.

I have embraced this new world,
as my own.
Here, in a place so far removed form my old life,
I have found a home;
where I can place my sadness
into a boat made of folded love letters and photographs;
and set it all adrift on the easy tide that takes all things,
everything,
back out to the sea and away.

I imagine,
all the ache and uncertainty
inside me,
as a gray and heavy weight;
like the driftwood that washes up on my beachhead,
or the pier pilings that break free from their duty
and sometimes float free after a storm.
As immense as these things are,
the current always takes them away
over time.

Where all this heavy substance goes,
is a mystery?
Perhaps,
there is a beach,
just like mine,
on the other side of the world;
where another unhappy soul,
studies the immense garbage
that has washed ashore
into his unhappy life?
He looks at the crazy
gnarled driftwood,
discovers a name carved in it's side;
carves his own name on another branch
of this broken, buoyant tree of life,
and then drags it all off the shoreline
and sets it adrift once again.

Even the heaviest of weights,
can rise up
and float away
on the sea.

So,
for the last two days,
I have sat out on the pier,
and dropped a line into the water.
And tonight,
as the sun made it's way home across the water,
a thin line of incandescent filament
with a hook and a bloodworm,
and a lead weight wasn't enough.
With my usual purpose and dedication,
I began to remove my clothes.
As each piece of my outer layer
was peeled off,
it was folded neatly
and placed upon the rusty crab trap.
When there was nothing left,
but my boxer shorts,
I took a deep breath,
removed these too,
and then,
dove into the water.

Dropping a line into the water
just wasn't enough anymore.

I needed
to baptise me.

Something inside me,
just needed to float.
Perhaps I needed the sea,
to ease and lift,
the weight
of all this ache and uncertainty
inside of me?
I worried.
Had I become so heavy,
that even the strength of water couldn't lift me up?

And like the driftwood,
I floated.
And it was awe inspiring to be so weightless once again.
It was like being in love.
It was like Christmas morning.
It was like the embrace of a lover,
after waking from a horrible dream.
It was.
I was.

And I floated and bobbed about
as the sun set.
And for a moment,
I imagined that I was
just driftwood,
with a lonely strangers name carved in my side,
waiting for the tide and current
to carry me away.

Where Have I Been?

Since my last post,
I have written with dedication
and purpose.
And nothing seems good enough to me.
I write,
and commit words
to this body of work,
and it all just seems so
out of place
and foreign.
For every day that has passed since my last post,
I have composed at least two new entries.
And each of these
labors of love,
are aborted and cast aside.

Is my focus,
waning,
or waxing?
I am left to wonder.

This whole simple thing
was nothing more than experiment.
A experiment of words and images
dedicated to the discovery of self-awareness
during a time of great duress and ache.
This was a living,
self-enacted autopsy.
It was through great strength,
and stupidity,
that I was able to cut and tear these words
out from beneath the viscera and sinew
of me.

And tonight,
as a cool wind blows in from the east,
across the subtle shattered blue glass surface
of Old Road Bay,
I wonder;
what have I gained?

I don't feel any better.
Truth be told,
I feel worse.
My sense of aloneness
and solitude
has only been heightened and reinforced.

I am only at peace,
as the sun falls,
and the night climbs over the water.

My days,
are just moments spent
waiting.
Until night falls
when I can walk free
and unencumbered,
about the beach
and down the pier;
spot-lighting glistening leopard-print gooey slugs,
and the intricate and fleeting architecture of spiders on the hunt.

Last night
whilst dreaming or awake,
I am not sure,
I was visited by what seemed like a thousand restless souls.
They filed passed my bed
and were compelled to touch me.
A thousand unfamiliar hands
softly reached out
and grazed my being
as they passed,
by my bed and through my room.
One small soul,
climbed over me
as it made it's way out the window next to my bed.
Such a small thing was so heavy
that it felt as if I would be crushed
deep into the mantle of this earth
as it made its way home.

And I lay,
without a scream of terror
or a shout of joy.
I just let them all pass
over and through me.
And then there was just me.

This morning,
I watered my basil plant,
smoked my cigarette,
and drank my coffee.
It was no different from any other morning
here in my exile.
I have a ledger
in which I make note of the first words I utter
each morning.
I began this exercise
because I was puzzled
and worried
by my lack of vocalization.
I realized,
that without anyone to converse with,
I was beginning to lose my familiarity with my own voice.
So,
I began writing down,
my first words,
each and every day.

After
my morning routine,
I entered the bathroom
and looked upon myself in the mirror.
I was shocked to find,
my side burns and a decent portion of the hair
on the side of my head
had gone gray.
Perhaps I have neglected to check up on me?
Perhaps I am just in need of a haircut,
and the gray was growing out unnoticed?
Perhaps I have lost touch with the physical me?

Whatever the case may be,
here are the first words I spoke this morning,
"Dear Lord man, where have you been?"