A blank page, a story untold
the salty air and sun kissed cheeks,
the murmuring sea whispers many tales
all are secrets for my heart to hold

If I stay, I wonder what  I would find
happy old couples in their beach houses
hidden trails deep in campgrounds
perhaps something new and one of a kind

A story ends and a new one starts
good food,  sun-soaked relaxation, and sand
memories relieved and new ones created
all just new chapters I hold in my heart.

Lake folk don’t get us swamp people
spit it like an insult
say drain it
mock her swamp ***
write don’t let your data lake become it
a dump where it all flows in and
none of it flows out
it shouldn’t take a data scientist
to know that’s a salt sea *******
go drain a different metaphor
take an unstructured Saturday
let old black tea
rain run off to steep in Cyprus leaves
learn you to forget
learn you on its knees to
spec out a filter
think you could march across
this neon ****
without soggy socks
look away
sink in with spirits of sorely missed runaways
husbands to humble azaleas
pompous camellias
shepherds to growling gators
shy snappers
hissing cottonmouths
beneath chartreuse buzzard whirlpools
while a redheaded woodpecker encodes clus.ter.****.
while a blue jay screams thief! Thief!
for nobody but me too listening
tunnel through gray beards
machines lynched dead in live oaks
saunter from Four Holes to the lazy Edisto
meander to meet her shady cousins
an ACE up three sleeves
past ***** waving fiddler *****
freshen up the breakers
then tell me you do not find lovely
my Lowcountry’s languid spleen
;