High Tide

High Tide


Long after you have swung back
I would watch you in the day time
sipping coffee from a Starbucks cup
on the porch of my raggedy apartment building downtown
and wonder how you ever got away,
wondered how three years of separation felt like a lifetime,
remembering how I would think you were still with me;
because it felt like you had never left
seeing as you would come in close to the shore,
kiss me on the tide,
and drift away gently
as I was nudged awake but the stark reality
that you were only there in my dreams.

I was a boat knocking up against an empty pier
trying its best to break free
from the rope that was you,
that had me tied in waters you no longer swam.
But you came back,
swung back in like high tide
on a full moon night
and as I watched you fiddle with the coffee cup
on that damn apartment porch
I was finally at peace;
you’d taken me out of the water
and let me walk on the shore with you again.