Barefoot Poem by Cj Heck

Barefoot and holding hands,
we walked the water’s edge.
I remember looking down
at our hands. I couldn’t tell
where your fingers stopped
and my fingers began
and how good that felt.

Pants rolled up mid-calf,
we flirted with the waves
and then you wrote my name
in the sand with your big toe
and we laughed until we cried.

We talked about you, and me,
and whispered of the brand new us.
The colors of the sunset
had blended the blue-green
of the water right into the sky
by the time we packed up our things
and put on our sandy shoes
to leave, and I had never felt
such joy and sweet abandon.

Sometimes at night
when sleep is a stranger
and the covers are pulled up chin-tight,
I think of that day on the beach,
how we talked of you, and me,
and the brand new us,
and the reckless abandon.
I can’t go barefoot now
without thinking about you.

We never talked about
the things that could get in the way
and how to push them aside.
We never gave a thought
to how it might someday end.