ABSOLUTELY

Mary McLoughlin

ABSOLUTELY NO RADIO PLAYING

Instead write lyrics to the wave’s melody
as you dance with the wind.
Stand on your feet to feel the percussion
of the wave’s bounding beats and
join in the seagull’s call for encore
in standing ovation.

 
ABSOLUTELY NO SKATEBOARDS, BICYCLES, OR ROLLERBLADES

 
Be carried on the beach’s cycle,
washed away like writing etched in sand
until the water running through you is
Whole
in the
Tide.

 
ABSOLUTELY NO PETS

 
Ignore all former notions of ownership
and let yourself belong to nature,
strong in your unwavering obedience to the world
as you stand at its edge
your feet dipped in its doorway.

 
ABSOLUTELY NO LITTERING

 
Do not leave, but take with you
the Reverence
of ocean wave
bowing before you
and mirror its holiness
as you worship the world in all its
unsuspecting
Glory.

 
ABSOLUTELY NO ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES

 
Rather, let the salt of the ocean saturate your veins
until it is enough to absorb
the grandeur
of every grain of
sand
and seashell cracked open
by the giving of itself.

 
ABSOLUTELY NO NUDITY

 
Clothe yourself in the Sun’s majesty
allowing its threads to turn you
Gold
beyond value
as you survey the
Kingdom
trickling beneath your toes.

 
ABSOLUTELY NO SWIMMING UNSUPERVISED

 
Let the enormity of
All
stand in
Witness
to your
being
never forsaking the
fullness of
company
in even your smallest seconds.

Mary McLoughlin is an eighteen-year-old student in New York and will be starting at the University of Dayton in the fall. She writes poetry because it's the only place projecting emotion onto inanimate objects is perceived as art rather than insanity.