Peace
A poem about looking for salvation on the open sea.
©Erica Cirino. Pacific Ocean, November 2016.
Out here
There is not much to see
But the sky and water
Which pass above and below me
Each day, each hour,
Each minute, each second.
Each day is mostly the same.
I spend my time
Steering and cleaning
And cooking and writing,
And wondering
Why I came
Out here.
Deep down,
I know.
Out here,
I thought
I could be saved,
I could find purpose,
A vision
Of my true self,
An understanding
Of what
I am doing here
As one small being
On a vast planet.
So I went looking for myself
Out here,
At sea,
Beneath the great white sails
That stand quiet
And taut in the gale
Yet flap loudly in the calm,
Sounding like
A thousand pages
Turning
In an enormous book;
Amongst the elegantly gliding seabirds
And the sleek blue-gray dolphins,
That eye the ship
With a look
Of both curiosity and caution;
With a group of strangers
Whom I share little in common with
Other than my sense of adventure
And humanity.
After 23 days
At sea,
When my bare feet meet
Solid earth
For the first time
In a long time,
And my legs sway
Like reeds in a breeze
Unused to the stillness,
My body still seeking
The strange comfort
Of movement,
Of the wind and the waves,
I ask myself,
“Have you found what you were looking for,
Out there?”
Yes, I believe I did
Find something:
Peace.