Summertime After You

This poem is dedicated to all my dear friends who are graduating in a few weeks. I will miss you, but I know each of you will shape the world with your brilliance. I’m so grateful for every memory we made together.

Summer comes like a hurricane— 
sudden and devastating and inevitable 
I shouldn’t be surprised 
For the past eight months, I’ve been preparing for the storm, 
steeling my heart for the impact I have no choice but to bear 

But nothing can prepare you for the first wave 
as it creeps forward on the distant horizon, 
taunting you with the childish hope that it will spare you 
if you don’t stare it in the eye 
until it rushes onto your shore like an invading army 
until it crashes into your home like an uninvited guest 
until it swallows every lovely thing you’ve ever known 
in a single terrible bite 

Yesterday, we were dancing on the beach in the sweet evening breeze, 
too spellbound by the sunset to fear the rising sea 
wrapped in the blissful illusion of forever that comes 
when two souls find joy in each other’s company 

Now I stand alone on the barren shore 
in a graveyard of ruined telephone wires 
slumping like fallen crosses over tombs of absence 
I dig through displaced sand on hands and knees 
searching for monuments to the love that once grew here, 
some piece of you the tide couldn’t steal from me 
I find a scrap of cloth, a tarnished chain, a single pearl earring 
and squeeze them between my shaking fingers like a rosary, 
praying that faith and love alone could return 
the priceless treasures I lost at sea 

But you are not lost 
You are not clinging to a scrap of driftwood in the fathomless deep 
Your vessel travels through foreign waters, but you stand proud at the prow,
commanding your ship through a brave new voyage 
sailing through distant seas with bright eyes and a hopeful heart 
touching the farthest corners of the earth with your brilliant beauty 

So I find solace in the night sky  
because we are all charting our paths under the same stars 
May your mast hold firm 
May your compass point true 
And perhaps when we have both journeyed long enough, 
the sea that now divides us will carry us till we meet again 

For now, I build anew this island we both loved 
and from the debris, I craft my own ship