Eight days in a farm house beside the beach.
Thin walls can’t mute
The promise of navy blue one-piece.

Shucking oysters on bicycles to the beach,
joy starts as a trickle.
A gleam of happiness laying in plain sight.

I only have to stoop to retrieve it.
Yet touching it, I become golden.
Midas' curse is my promise.

Pleasure, at first skin deep, is transmuted by passion
Into a physical joy. Joy I won’t grasp
For fear it is fleeting.

Let go. Fall back. Land in its clouds. Eat the lotus
and retch
A blue dress with red eyes crying.
No shelter. I won’t eat lotus.