And He Waited

And he waited in the sea’s hand

Far from the patient golden sanguine sand

For 100 watery-eyed years

The classical sea of antiquity upon him,

covering his strange comfortless fears

Like her beautiful mandala’d blue white blanket

They once shared,

Spread wide over what once was bare.

And the sailors rowing by

saw him swell to giant size

like the charging Caligulan barge

seen of Pliny the Elder, seawise

So that he might for her wait

another briny salted, barnacle-heavy

400 seasons.

And they begged him to come ashore

And wait for her no more.

But he stayed in place, with no quick reasons.

And still he sat, with head hinged low

And his heart languished deep

in each ancient wave.