or at least in the general vicinity
of Flying Point Beach,
certainly closer than I normally am

to that beach where the ocean
crests the dunes at high tide
spilling tons of new salt water into Mecox Bay,

and probably closer to Flying Point Beach
than you are right now
or I happen to be as you read this.

But how close do I really need to be
to Flying Point Beach
or to any beach in order to write these lines?

Oh, Flying Point Beach,
I love all three words in your name,
not to mention the deep, white sand

and the shorebirds on their thin legs
facing into the wind
along that low stretch between the ocean and the bay.

How satisfying it is to be
even within bicycling distance of you,
though it’s dangerous to ride at the edge of these roads.

Thoreau had his cabin near a pond.
Virginia Woolf stood on the shore of the River Ouse,
and here I am writing all this down

not ver far at all—maybe twenty minutes by taxi
if the driver ever manages to find this place—
from the many natural wonders of Flying Point Beach.

 = Karen Marek