Safe, in a world unlike my own

I didn't get there at 4.
But to be away from here,
4:16 PM
and I wasn't here. Not by the mirror I eyed
myself in until I saw nothing.
I went to the beach, and this time all I brought was a book.
Sitting, to be judged by the vast expanse of sea, I am
the cat hiding behind the spiraling bush.
Of times I sang to it after years of quiet. Gentle strokes.

Rays of fur and lanes of lavender.

Of stepping on every slab of stone, even when my legs have grown far past their timid strides.
The stationed green swelling from the slate's embrace.
Of the days when conversations didn't concern me. Cocooned in heads far higher than mine, and arms that hold all that rushes by us.

Of the slow hum of wild hair. And a day at the beach.