All seas are one, in a manner of speaking,
water flows to water. Standing at the Bay of Bengal
my feet are touched by waves that may have kissed
Pacific shores. No matter how we look at it,
all Gods too, are one, even the ones that are not. 

I thought of my mother, on a Fowler’s bed,
who could not feel the sea breeze again. 
And I thought of my long dead father, who told me
never to hold back, to squeeze every last drop
out of life, to laugh and love, with abandon.

There was a time I believed that I should stop
doing all the things my father loved, but then
I’d have to stop living. So as long as I am
in this world, I do everything he loved 
and I know, in my bones, he lives through me. 

So? Does my mother feel the breeze I sit in, does it
caress her face, can she taste the salt in my mouth
from the surf that sent me tumbling away? 
Thoughts tumble into thoughts, thoughts of all 
the lives I carry, the bodies that dwell with me. 

Condemn me all you want but there are many routes
that lead to the same corner, many ways to the same sum,
totals totalling themselves to different answers, 
all of which are right. Like the seas of people touched 
by the same waters, kissing different shores.