Drowning

I've told you before

I remember nearly drowning once

- made small by swells

that had seemed tame from the sand

just moments before.

Screaming for someone,

my voice stolen by marbled effervescence

and vastness- shoulders surrendering.

That time the rip took me back in.

I was lucky.

This place is a sea too you know.

Don't forget its depth.

Its basalty bed rests in cold darkness

fathoms below the streets, the lights

and our ever-treading soles. 

Waves sweep through windows

and the rip swipes your feet from
the surest of floors

- a phantom peril.

You called out, didn't you?

As loudly as you could have,

and yet almost imperceptibly

-many decibels below

the noise, the talk and the metal tides.