I Must Go Down to the Seas Again
You should too
Darkness settles on roofs and walls,
But the sea, the sea in the darkness calls;
—Longfellow
I keep thinking about my ocean.
At the start of summer, I went to the coast for a week and stayed five minutes walk from the ocean. My ocean.
Every morning I swam with its salty, cold waves. Drifting serenely or throwing myself against its terrible strength, by turns. Every evening, I walked beside it, feeling its balmy winds beat against me, my hair flying and eyes watering.
As I walked, I whispered lines of Mazefield’s poem, “Sea Fever”, to the wind:
I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by;
And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea’s face, and a grey dawn breaking.
Or turned the thin yellowed pages of my poetry book to Tennyson’s “Break Break Break”.
Not because I’m quirky or performative or trying to get a guy’s attention, but because there are words outside of phone screens to be read. There are worlds of beauty wrapped up in poetic rhythm that no Instagram reel can capture. There is a difference one ought to feel in the way your thumbs caress soft paper instead of swiping a shiny screen. There is nothing like the tactile solidness of a book where one author, in his struggle to capture beauty and order, pours his little slice of mortality from his beating heart onto a fragile page. It is so unlike the vibrating chasm of electricity that echoes the whole world’s voices from a six-inch rectangle. Did the same species really make both?
The thing I miss most about my ocean is the infinity. Staring at the horizon where sky and water meet in a streak of grey feels like staring into forever. Like there is no end to that dark churning blue-green water, on and on. I just wanted to find a little boat to take me off the end of the jetty and sail away on the forever.
One evening, from the house porch, I saw the moon, giant and orange, rising over the ocean. My sister and I ran out, following its light down the road and onto the beach. I went up to the waves, skipping past the tide pools, and stared at that beautiful moon hanging right above my ocean, leaving a shimmering path of moonshine that stretched out to sea.
There is no feeling like standing at the edge of a jetty, far out from land. You go past the edge to the large, slippy black rocks and stand there for a moment, arms out for balance, feet gripping the wet crags.
The wind is whipping something fierce against you, and you feel like you are defying death. The ceaseless waves crash all about, foaming white at the edges where they meet the rock, like great hungry mouths. Their strength does not weaken; they seem to be waiting for one false move, sure that they will overpower you in the end. So you stand there, gazing fixedly out to sea, out to that infinity; trying to will this moment, each sense, the beat of the waves, smell of salt, sharp wind against the face, forever into your mind. Amazed that no matter how long you stare, that wonderful, breathing ocean never changes, never disappears.
Then, though you have stood there a long time, waiting and waiting, you know you must go. You can’t outwatch the ocean. You shall have to leave, and it cannot follow. So you do it quickly, without thinking, for fear you might stay forever. You pull away from the tremendous vitality of the wind and waves and turn your back on forever. Walking slowly back across the puddled concrete, minding not to slip. Taking furtive glances over your shoulder to see that your ocean is still there.
It was cool outdoors this morning, there’s a different scent in the air. A few leaves drift lazily to the ground. I know autumn is coming. But my ocean will still be there next summer. Didn’t I tell you it’s forever?
~Mandalynn