Onto my paper I spilled the sea,
Stole the water into my ink,
Snatched the shell from its deep bowels
to bring the beauty home with me.
I left my footprints on the sand
with the childish notion of a dream
without the thought of taking a friend
away from child, sea, and land.

I set the shell upon my desk
to hear the music of the wave
unaware of the poor souls
unable to reach its opaline cave.

I walked upon the pallid shore
with footprints trailing behind
hearing a boy who's eyes did outpour
a ballid of sorrow, and anger combined.
"I hear no sea." he said in shame.
Knowing I was the obtuse fool, the only dazed soul that was to blame.
I stole the sea for me alone and left nothing for this boy. Treating it no better than a selfish baby with a toy.

I set the shell back to its place in a luminecent bend. Back beside the thing it loves, the sea which calls it friend.

There is a lesson to be learned from this childish act of a narrowed mind
that growing up can cause some pain when letting go of time. I know the young grow into the firm, and the firm grow into the young, and I know of hours ticking away as familiar as words forming your tounge.

But have you ever heard of such a crime as growing up to old? Holding to the tot within can iron away all wrinkles in a fold.

So in case I were to provoke a thought, like the image of an older me,
I kept a little on my paper... just a little of the sea.