The Dock

The dock near my family’s cabin was destroyed in the last round of storms.   It’s hard to express how much this simple dock meant to me and my collective family.  It has been a part of the landscape of my life forever.  Please enjoy the following poem and painting dedicated to this special place.  

 

The Dock 

Older than the life of me

it landscapes every memory I have

of summers with my family on the Puget Sound.  

It was aging like the rest of us for years;

weathered, greened, and barnacled—

but always still a path that we all braved

above the tide flats, sometimes water high.

We’d walk or run, tweedle birds and seagulls clearing,  

to the end, a spot where every member of my family

has stood at one point or another

always filling up the same hole in the sky.

 

I see my husband kneeling years ago

asking for my hand in marriage—

The same spot where my grandpa stood and

smiled for a picture, famous in my family now.  

And even though my life began

years after his was done,

I would always see the dock and think

of him as near; binoculars on ready

waiting, watching, welcoming us all

to the place where we collectively  

could breathe. 

 

Feel now still the saline wind,

Feel now still the creaking planks beneath your steps.

Feel now still the late-night summer sun

setting like a melting pat of butter on the sea.

Though a storm has come I close my eyes

and I can feel it still.