Barefoot

"In the end, these things are what matter most:
How well did you love?
How fully did you live?
How deeply did you let go?"
~Siddartha Gautama


Barefoot
by CJ Heck

Barefoot and
holding hands
we waded
the water’s edge.
I remember
looking down
at our hands.
I couldn’t tell
where your fingers
stopped
and mine began
and how good
that felt.
Pants rolled up
mid-calf,
we flirted
with the waves
and you wrote
my name
in the sand
with your big toe
and we laughed
until we cried.
We talked
about you,
and me,
and whispered
of us.
The colors
of sunset
blended the
blue-green
of the water
into the sky
as we packed
our things
and put on
sandy shoes
and I had never
felt such joy
and sweet abandon.
Sometimes at night
when sleep
is a stranger
and the covers
are up chin tight
thoughts turn
to a beach,
talk of you,
talk of me,
and how the us
is now the
sweet abandon.
We never spoke of
things that could
get in the way
and how to
push them aside.
We never
gave a thought
to an end
at all
and I can’t go
barefoot
without thinking
of you.