you’ve left me
on Siesta Beach
Janet Kuypers
07/29/11
got a hotel
overlooking Siesta Beach
to see you
it was all
about sand and sun and fun
when we were together
but after
spending all night on the beach with you
last night
we argued
and I screamed at you to leave me alone
so you stormed away
I couldn’t tell
if you were defiant or dejected
when you left me at four a m
but when I got back
to my hotel overlooking the beach
I couldn’t sleep
I called your cell
at five a m
it jumped to your voice mail
at six I heard sirens
so I looked out my hotel window
overlooking the beach
and saw the lights
and two ambulances, and a crowd
circled at the shoreline
my God, I thought
it was just an argument, we’d be okay
it can’t be you
so I grabbed
my phone and my keys and ran
to the elevator
I stepped inside
and heard two people talking about
the unfolding news
I heard
“they found a man washed up on the beach,
he wasn’t in swim clothes
and he had no life vest,
so they think he committed suicide”
so... I ran
out of the elevator
as soon as those doors would open
sprinted to the beach
at the edge of the crowd
I dialed your number again, and again
no response
I glanced to my right
and saw EMTs and a gurney, with a
zipped body bag
I ran toward that body bag
a policeman stopped me, i begged
I said I may know the victim
so he brought me over to the EMTs
they said the man had no identification
I gulped
and said, I may know him
they looked at each other
and told me to be prepared
when they open the bag
I braced myself
then they slowly unzipped the bag
and I looked at his face
he was bloated
from being in the water so long
he was pale
from no blood curculating
and his eyes were wide open:
I mean, it’s not like the movies
where an actor
can press their fingers over the dead’s eyes
and the eyes then stay closed
they even used to put coins
over the eyes of the dead in the old days
so
his eyes were wide open
I stared back at his vacuous stare
then turned away
“I don’t know this man,”
I told the EMTs, and they asked me
if I was sure
“people look different
when they die out in the water like this,”
they told me
and I said,
“that’s not his eye color,”
and I walked away
now I wonder
what really died that day
since I never heard from you again
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