Black's Beach

(the clothing-optional beach near San Diego)

The heavy sand is as black as the stuff
that abides with gold in the Sierra.

Black-suited surfers march
along the beach in martial service
to the obsession. A nude

woman enacts yoga poses,
and I wonder why they never
offered that kind of thing
in high school physical education.
A solid replacement for
the badminton unit.

I sit naked on a purple towel
laid out on a washed-up wooden pallet.
There are other old washed-up
hippies (not the most accurate word,
but it will do) who dot the beach
in stupendous sunshine and fresh air.
Erosion-scarred brown bluffs rise above us.

I suppose we're absently wondering
where all the parties went to.
Answer: nowhere.  They just go on
without us. Somewhere we got

separated from our pods and
ended up on this beach.

It's not a big gulp of freedom.
Only a sip or two. Now a brown
young woman wades out into surf,
presents her body to the ocean,
dips her hands into the water
as if it were cool liquid silver.

She brings her hands to her face.
She runs her fingers through her hair.
I lie back like an old sea lion
and close my eyes.


hans ostrom 2016