Poem: Sand and Legs

Getty/Valerii Apetroaiei

A poem from the forthcoming book Real.Vibrant, poems for all that matters

On this lost and found afternoon
sitting seaside
her outstretched legs
are the same color as the ocean sand, a few feet away.

Her ankles and shins are the dunes.
Her cocoa knees are the mountains.
Just beyond the space between her inlet legs are the rivers and
streams.

The estuary is her shadowy woman’s nest.
Her navel is the center of the world.
Her breasts are cloudy volcanoes.
Her throat and neck command the thunder and the wind.
Her lips are every oasis.
Her tongue tastes salted sky and earth.
Her eyes we know are the moon and the sun.
Her nose the caves, the ones we see and the ones we don’t.
Her ears are conch shells making poems spiral deeply,
deciphering the inner-standing of this all.

The spray of the ocean is cool on her fontanelle crown.
She sits and everything sits with her.
She tosses her hair mid-air making trees,
plants and even seaweed sway.
It’s there with legs and sand, and sand and legs.

Sand and Legs is a poem that lyrically reveals our oneness with nature and how we possess an extraordinary and hallowed relationship with Mother Earth.

S&H readers, I invite you to take my poem with you, if only in spirit, as you venture out to the shore to set your gaze upon the water and vast sky before you and luxuriate in the interbeing-ness we surely have with all things.

This poem came to me while on the beach by the Pacific Ocean as the sun was setting. I glanced down at my legs and in that flash experienced an optical illusion: I couldn’t tell where the sand ended and my legs began as both had the same golden color and smooth-dune texture. I was enthralled to discover my beach and body’s magical connection. And, from this beautiful unity revealed, Sand and Legs came forth like a song, with much gratitude to my poetry muses.

Mil gracias, Charlotte Eulette, Poet

Poetry

About the Author

Charlotte Eulette, is a poet, writer, and cofounder of the Celebrant Foundation & Institute. She’s been a poet and a great lover of poetry most of her life, drawing zest and inspiration from her Greek heritage and her...

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