Tide Running

sea breathing
The sea rolling and swelling up itself down by them rocks on Plymuth Point. Breathing out, sucking 'e belly back in. Every time it spuff slow, li'l crabs stop and hold on tight to the rocks. It fooling them. Only snorting and slurping back in, snuffling and bubbling. Them white crusty shells on the deep black rocks hissing and crackling every time the sea show 'e ribs. Big sea-eggs, urchins, tuck down in the holes and cracks. Some pack-up together so close, all you see is a poison-black patch, long prickas sticking out 'gainst the green coral. Make you skin crawl. I stay still, still as the rock face behind me.
Out past the swellin' chest, all blue and green, the sea stretch 'e arm way up along the hills. Past Arnos Vale, Culloden, Moriah, and Castara. Every time it heave, the arm ripple and, far far away, white waves wash over rocks, silent. Long white fingernailsstretching out, clawing and scratching at the cliffs. The hills don't take-on the sea beating-up on they feet. Them hills stand the way they always was. Spirits in the valleys, smooth green humps and dark trees. The only thing that does change on them is the colors. They browning quick now. Every sky-clear day, blazing sun burning off more green. Soon will only be dry brown--and then fire. Real fire. Smoking and spreading with the breeze over them hills' shoulders. Burning for days. Leaving black scars. And then the sea go laugh. Shake-up 'eself and romp with the breeze. Show off to the beat-up hills, booming 'gainst the cliffs and blowing out the biggest waves 'e can push. Then the sea go turn up 'e colors, swallow down the green, lighten the light blue, and darken the deep. Liven up 'eself and laugh. Everything 'bout the sea big-up in them dry-season days, even the fish and all. Them days, the sea does talk more. Make me want it more. And when I walk down the hill from home, brown grass go crunch under me foot and the hot smell'a the land go dry-up me nose. Trees drop leaves like brown paper, seedpods crack open, and rivers disappear. But the sea, 'e does get stronger. I like it for that. If there wasn' no sea, I must would feel lock-up. In a box with only the top open to the sky.
An then, in the full'a the rain season, heavy rain does come and out the sea spirit. And the hills start living again, steaming, trees stretching out and bamboo bending with new leaves. The rain does bring out every kind'a green you can imagine, everything dripping. I does say then, "It look like the sea turn upside down," 'cause the sea turn same gray like the sky, green as the land, water beating down everywhere like if the sea '' 'eself in true. But even then, the land can't give you that sea feeling.And I know when I look at the sea, dark and flat so, that big fish breeding, things that I can't see going on down there. Deep in the belly of the sea. Is the same sea that does reach everywhere. When I look at the silva-line on the sea, it more far away than the skyline on the land. That's 'cause the sea so big. If I could'a never see it at all, nowhere 'round me, it go be like you lock me up. Drain something out'a me and leave a hole in me chest.
I breathe in and let it out in time with the next swell'a water under me. Two li'l sergeant fish, yellow and black stripe, pass over the black sea-egg prickas. I pull up me T-shirt onto me neck back and watch me shadow move 'cross the coral. Wave me fingers to see the extra waggles the water make with the shadow.
Copyright © 2001, 2003 by Oonya Kempadoo