Memories
Tim Thornburgh
Do you remember
diving in coral gardens,
Masked faces streaming bubbles
as we cut through shimmering seas,
Sleek bodies finning a wake
propelling our streaking shadows
like mated dolphins rising from the deep,
Surfacing in a gasp of air
heads lifted towards the clouds
swimming at lofty heights,
Suspended between star-splendored night skies
winking at lunar tides beaching us
like a throw of the dice
As the man-in-the-moon says,
“Let them roll as they may.”
Do you remember
the ceiling of stars,
Rising in the velvet dream-light
illuminating mated footprints
countersunk in wet beach sand
as a luminescent wave
swells on the surface of the sea,
“Brighter than fireflies on a starless summer night.”
You say recalling glittering green lights
glowing in the palm of your hand,
As your nimble fingers comb
and sift for gold finds
in the sandy rivers of my wavy hair
caressed in a lost search
riding the tail of a shooting star.
Do you remember
freewheeling through time?
On bicycles ridden in tandem
along asphalt roadways
under canopy of ancient Flame Trees
flowering in bursts of blossoms-
Kaleidoscopic colors
spinning from peach to ripe orange
to a blush to glowing ember red
fading to fuchsia,
Just as we swell and flow
In motion with swirling sands,
In motion with buoyant seas,
In motion with shifty clouds,
In motion with shooting stars,
In motion with blooms of Flame Tree blossoms,
In motion with joined bodies,
Undulating on a shared axis,
Waterbed of fond dreams remembered.
Tim Thornburgh
Tim Thornburgh graduated from Seattle University and shortly thereafter joined the Peace Corps. He served as a high school teacher of English and History at Outer Islands High School in Falalop, Ulithi. Tim has also worked in Yap, Pohnpei, Saipan, the Philippines and Dayton, Ohio. Tim now lives in the spring, summer and fall in Bremerton, Washington. Tim's poetry has been published in The San Fernando Poetry Journal, Amelia, the Haight Ashbury Literary Journal, Humanidat, Moose Bound Press, Night Roses, Four Tulips, 7th Circle, Lowlife Lit Press, Sublimation and After Thought.