Wet Rocks!

The rather sprightly old man takes a turn on the ocean path

To an old favorite spot where one can walk out on to the rocks and can sit in splendid silence.

He arrives and looks out and says to himself,

“Dude!”

(And yes, he refers to himself as “Dude”. He is that kind of old man.”)

He continues talking to himself,

“Today is not a day to venture out onto the wet rocks.

They are slippery from the crashing ocean waves

And wet from the intermittent but insistent drizzle.

I could fall and hit my head

And lay there bleeding on the rocks,

Semi-conscious, unable to talk, moaning and groaning.

Hikers will come by in the usual groups of two or three

And stand up here looking past where I’ll be laying.

Staring out into the fog and seeing nearly nothing at all.

Only hearing my incomprehensible utterances and assuming that I am just another hangry seagull.”

He speaks to himself again,

“Dude, maybe it is just time for you to stop taking these kinds of risks!”

He looks out to the jigsaw puzzles of flat and jagged rocks.

Some large and some small,

But nearly all glistening of treacherous wetness.

And he says to himself,

“Well, kid. Do you feel lucky?”

He carefully takes a step forward.

Then another.

Then another.