Moon Knows Ocean

Moon knows Ocean can hold
what I yearn to set down.

Before my ocean trip,
I drove to my scheduled massage.
Yes, bodyworkers should care for their own bodies too
if they want to give from a steady source.

Receiving bodywork is an invitation
to touch the hidden vaults where pain and wisdom reside.

I like touching those places,
seeing what rises under the hands of someone I trust,
someone who knows that going deep
is more about the receiver’s surrender than the giver’s pressure.

I fall into lands of sleep and knowing, snoring softly,
feeling and remembering
what I didn’t even know
needed to be felt and remembered.

Why does my left quadricep stay tight and afraid?
Why does each piriformis scream under the gentlest touch?
Why do my hips cry, even when my legs feel strong?

Somewhere in me, grief rests.

Somewhere in me, it waits to soften.

The massage ends,
but the body remembers.
It remembers ache and tenderness,
where sorrow hides
and where love still hums.

It remembers it needs nourishment.

So I gather a lunch of avocado, greens, carrots, shrimp tempura,
and follow the memory further—
toward the shoreline.

☾

I expect to only stand at the edge,
to dance near the borders of the sea
and gaze at the horizon from a polite distance.

But the ocean calls differently when the moon is watching.

It begins with touching rocks,
speckled, striated, smoothed by time.
Shells with tiny perfect holes,
the kind only the sea knows how to place.

The sand warms;
grains sift and swirl between my toes.

The ocean calls, and I follow.

My legs adjust,
but when the water reaches my belly,
it steals my breath.

I pause, letting the cool tickle until breath and body agree again.

Deeper, slowly, at my pace—
no one outside sets my rhythm.

The water rises to my chest
and body collides with ocean memory:
that same ancient grief,
that same need to release.

I announce my surrender
to the waves,
to the patches of cool awakening,
to warmth that soothes away what still clings
to belly, to hips,
to my whole being.

Moon knows Ocean can hold
what I yearn to set down.

This is where I need to be:
Deep water.
Moon watching.
Ocean holding.

and body collides with ocean memory:
that same ancient grief,
that same need to release.