Lucy sat beneath the dock
Counting rocks
Washed up from the shore
Pondering time
Checking her watch
As she kicked the ocean tide.
Not a second later
It kicked out her feet
And she was pulled away
In the flow of the sea.
She reached
Grasping
For the surface
But the whirlpool of the storm
Held her under.
From between her legs
She was thrust from the sea
Going up, coming down
Nearly missing her neck
Unconscious.
As she sat up
She looked confusingly around
At the setting then
Checking her watch
Seeing her skin
Pale and her leg
Bleeding profusely.
She screamed
For a hand
As she slid
Down the side
Landing on a plane
Of coarse leather.
The salt of the sea
Stung her leg
As she was drug
Holding for life
On the fine of a monster.
It stopped
And she held on tighter
For the frostbite
Froze her leg black
And she looked down
Checking her watch
Knowing fully well
The punishment for being late.
She lost her grip
Slipping again
Drowning again
But this time
This beast of burden
Gently lifted her from
The water
As she held
Onto the tip of his horn.
Lucy hung there
Storing in the eye
Of a monster
With a silent understanding
Reassurance
That she would be okay.
A tear from her eye
Froze on her cheek
An attempt to heal
Her mangled body
Hanging from his tooth.
He tilted his head
To shoulder her
Sliding back down
Onto his back
Sitting, resting
Against his tooth,
Checking her watch.
‘Rest,’
and she closed her eyes
dreaming of cellophane
and thermal hues.
She awoke to fine the dock
And her friend resting by her side
Watched him swim off
And limped to the town doctor.
Checking her watch.
