The girl on the bench at the marina

9/9/2011

I met a girl who every Sunday afternoon sits on the bench by the old pier where the wind is soft but always blows, where joggers and bicyclists parade up and down the shoreline trail in their silly clothes, where couples stroll arm in arm and the destitute woman with the sequine hat pushes her shopping cart but does not ask for charity, where homeless men and seagulls fish for their dinner in the waters around the pilings and as the seagulls loft on the breeze they shit white splotches shaped like starfish on the wooden planks of the pier; she sits there on the bench and she says many things to me; she says that the ugly and the beautiful are twin manifestations of a larger whole, that if a person could know the ocean it would be a better approximation of eternity than anything else we might experience in this world, that sometimes she looks to the western horizon and believes she can feel the push and pull of cold saline waters swelling into the bay through the gap at the feet of the golden gate bridge, or the warm brackish waters of the bay releasing themselves back into the ocean with a sigh when the tides reverse, she says that imagination makes time a plaything for the mind, and I have asked her if she can see our lives in fast-forward and reverse like a movie montage of memories some past and some yet to come, but she smiles distantly and says that if ever I want to ask a prescient girl whether she sees me in her future, I should have the courage to ask her as directly as I can, for such ambiguity would surely count against me.



The Girl at the Marina: 9/9/2011

I met a girl who every Sunday afternoon sits on the bench by the old pier where the wind is soft but always blows, where joggers and bicyclists parade up and down the shoreline trail in their silly clothes, where couples stroll arm in arm and the destitute woman with the sequine hat pushes her shopping cart but does not ask for charity, where homeless men and seagulls fish for their dinner in the waters around the pilings and as the seagulls loft on the breeze they shit white splotches shaped like starfish on the wooden planks.  She sits there on the bench and she says many things to me; she says that the ugly and the beautiful are one and the same, that if a person could know the ocean they might know eternity, that sometimes she looks to the western horizon and imagines the strain of those cold ocean waters pushing into the bay through the gap at the feet of the golden gate bridge, or the warm release of brackish bay waters flowing into the ocean with a sigh when the tides reverse.  She says that imagination makes time a plaything for the mind.  I ask her if she can see our lives in fast-forward and reverse like a hollywood montage or a slideshow of old family photographs, but she smiles distantly and says that if I ever wanted to ask a prescient girl whether she sees me in her future, I should have the courage to ask her as directly as I can.