i was nine and small

mouthed when i found

what would be my suicide note

in a bottle by the boulders

at kleinmond



at the time i believed

i was too smart for this world and so

paradoxically

i could not understand

how love could ****



children are foolish in some ways\and in some ways fortunate



sometimes what is not meant

to be will be

and what is meant

to be will not

but if everyone had just one

person i don’t think it could

be called love



although i don’t know what else

it could be



when i think about how

many people drown in my town

every summer

i wonder if maybe it was never intended

for us to learn to swim



i could make a similar

argument about love