WEBVTT

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"Beach Read."

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"The morning is warm and
hazy, mysterious, as if

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translated from Spanish.

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Just seeing that from
the country of Lorca,

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a poem has been
brought into English,

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one is warmed as one is
warmed by the sight of boys

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who lie on a beach,
a boys-only section,

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though a mild,
chill breeze crosses

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the sand and their isolation,
islands unto themselves

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and their personal
rituals, and nobody talks.

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By the look of them, there are
many languages represented.

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This is a beach
known internationally

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for the beauty of its boys.

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Reading further, the
second stanza disappoints.

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There could never
be another Lorca.

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But there's the
action of the waves,

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the caustic talking of
gulls, and the cliffs back

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at the beach, the
crumbling cascades

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like brown, dry waterfalls.

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Everything disappoints,
even Lorca,

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abandoning lovers on
train station platforms

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and in the smoke of bars.

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The boombox reports
a soldier's body

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has been found in the
undergrowth at a public park.

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It's made to sound
like a scandal.

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A secret life is supposed.

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Documents were faxed to
explain the circumstances,

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to paper over the incident,
the unanswered questions.

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A boy carves initials in
the sand with a stick.

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His initials?

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Those of a new lover?

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What about your new love?

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Just hope for a love
you would surely

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have if you could speak in
the language of anemones.

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The boy erases the initials
with a sweep of his foot.

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It's all in your mind.

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Nothing disappoints, or
happens in isolation.

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A fighter jet streaks low over
the coast, where the boys lie

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on pastel towels at careful
intervals, pale rosettes

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on a sepia wedding cake.

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The poem, translated
from Spanish,

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preens on its own intelligence.

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That's the problem.

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Had it oiled and combed its hair
with a part down the middle,

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like a Spanish sailor
just off a freighter,

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so that a thing of beauty lay
before the reader, a thing

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in isolation, but not in
isolation, as if among others

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on a famous beach, one might
have thought of the perfume

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Lorca favored, or the
tanned foot of a stranger,

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kicking at surf, testing it.

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Too cold for me?

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Intelligence, surely,
is not the enemy.

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Distance, coldness, a regard
only for one's own island,

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which is fear.

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So that's the secret.

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OK then, I'll remove
my shirt so that you

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might have a clear target."

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