Soda Bottle Sorry/My Ocean Story
Cabanatuan, Philippines
2017, Senior, Poetry & Spoken Word
from the day my mother and father
first let me fling and fumble
into the water —
toes testing and tongue
later learning everything
all at once —
i have only ever known one ocean
in my ocean the stirs and splashing begin
five in the morning
with the resort staff pushing
the cigarette boxes
the slipper straps
yesterday’s mangoes
past the yellow buoys
all the way to the waves
they do not own
in my ocean i take it upon myself
to smooth the sand over
for my little cousins to re-scatter
to touch up the sun so it looks
the same way it has
for fifteen years i take it
upon myself to know
what needs to be pinched
off the shore at the end of the day
and after there are no
broken shells
or pink shovels
or busy crabs crawling out
of their houses
i sit satisfied on the soft sea foam
of my sectioned sea
looking out at the largeness of it,
at that endless shoreline of life,
at all the oceans i only know
through fast facts
on a television frame
through beached whales
and plastic boats
and little boys
i say those are not my oceans
so my own hands do not
have to sink under the weight
of war and waste
how safe
will this water feel if I stop
to think about all the things
i cannot string
into pretty necklaces
all the pieces for which i fail
to find purpose
all the bodies
i cannot bring home
the truth is
in all the oceans
people do not get paid
to save when something
brown or dead or useless
rides along the waves
it is not ours
if we inch away
those are not our oceans
until we have to make
a living off it every day
until we can no longer swim
a few meters without
our own synthetic skins
spinning us in circles
until finally the oceans
we love so much are
the ones they make
minute long news reports of
our ocean is not a hotel run
heaven a clean cutout coast
in our ocean the castaways come
cold and clattering after a long trip
from home in our ocean
the laughter dies by sunset
and only the soft clangs
of abandoned cans and crackling
plastic bags crash along
to the chorus of the waves
this is our ocean
so when something shiny
or rotten or wet tickles
my knees or clings
to my legs
i will shudder and i will
call it gross i will hold
it up far from my face
and my nose at first
i do not remember
tossing it in the water
but this is ours, this is yours
this is mine
and by this time we all know very well
what should never belong
in our ocean
the truth is there oceans and oceans
all over i can never brave, or save
or even discover
but if i can throw a wrapper
or pick up a stick for
the sun-haired boys
who sell bracelets because
there isn’t ever
enough fish
if i can do anything
to keep the living
from coming up dry
on the sand
if i can do anything
for the children
of the children of anyone
who beat and blubbered
their way to better lands
for better lives
if i can start a ripple
to reach all of the hearts
my hands cannot
as if to say
this belongs to all of us
if i can take it upon myself
to give them
a better ocean
then they can take it upon
themselves to be
the better people
if my sadness turned
salt turned wind
turned love won’t be
enough to stop
the end
i will make amends
with my ocean
cycle and cycle
again
Reflection
I used the beach that my family and I have been going to for 16 years as inspiration because I only recently realized how terrible it is that because I find sanctuary in an ocean that is maintained by others, the ocean has never felt like my responsibility. In this poem, I come to terms with this. It is just as much a message to myself as it is a message to my readers. I also juxtapose the “ocean I know” with other oceans or beaches I end up seeing in news reports as a means of showing the oneness of all “oceans” or all bodies of water.