White Sands by Arthur Sze

White Sands

 

—walking along a ridge of white sand—

                                       it’s cooler below the surface—

               

we stop and, gazing at an expanse

              of dunes to the west,

                      watch a yellow yolk of sun drop to the         

                         mountains—

 

an hour earlier, we rolled down a dune,

                                         white sand flecked your eyelids

                                             and hair—

 

a claret cup cactus blooms,

                         and soaptree yuccas

                                                     move as a dune moves—

 

so many years later, on a coast, waves rolling to shore,

                             wave after wave,

 

I see how our lives have unfolded,

                           a sheen of

                                   wave after whitening wave—

 

and we are stepping barefoot,

              rolling down a dune, white flecks on our lips,

 

on our eyelids: we are lying in a warm dune

                                            as a full moon 

                                                                     lifts against an

                                                                           ocean of sky—