The Widening Sky

I am so small walking on the beach
at night under the widening sky.

The wet sand quickens beneath my feet
and the waves thunder against the shore.

I am moving away from the boardwalk
with its colorful streamers of people

and the hotels with their blinking lights.
The wind sighs for hundreds of miles.

I am disappearing so far into the dark
I have vanished from sight.

I am a tiny seashell
that has secretly drifted ashore

and carries the sound of the ocean
surging through its body.

I am so small now no one can see me.
How can I be filled with such a vast love?

-Edward Hirsch