Things I Sometimes Forget

• Lying in sand so white it looks like snow, while the sun beats down in waves on my back, heart throbbing into the hollow just beneath my stomach, a grittly cool hole that cradles me. Smelling the coconuty tinge of someone else's oil. Feeling regret that it will not last forever as you look out at the water which is impossibly greenblue and just the warmness of cool bathwater and salty on your skin. Eyelashes wet with drops of water, framing the white crashing surf .
  
• A hammock in the shade, dappled green, and a small black cat wanting to lie on your stomach. Birds circling on wind-currents above-- endlessly looping in their quest. One green lizard breathing and bobbing on the dry wooden decking, tasting a white flower briefly before moving away so fast you doubt he was really there.
  
• The quiet humming of an air conditioner while you lie on the softest cream-colored sheets you've ever seen, in a small hotel room in London, while around you a city out of history swirls busily with tourists and workers and bustling cars. You and him alone, napping, and the feeling of endlessness that will end.
  
• The smell of a horse who loves being brushed, as the sun goes down-- earth and dirt and sweat and grass and musk.
  
• Standing at an airport to wait for a man I am in love with but not yet admitting to love, watching the crowd of blurry faces for him, not seeing him, not seeing him, then, suddenly, he is there but going in the wrong direction. Chasing quietly after him, not really wanting to yell out his name in case you're wrong, but giggling slightly at the silliness of desperately chasing someone who is looking for you.
  
• That winter, even one which someone else would think of as mild but still keeps my toes never quite warm or dry enough, will ever end.