Sunrise

Sunrise
Sunrise on Sunset Beach

Saturday, January 16, 2021

Summers Once Were Cotton Candy

A memory shared by my daughter while riding the San Francisco Muni
home after work September 2, 2016.

Those fleeting hours we hit the strand – 
a band of cousins and eager aunts 
dragging our frazzled uncles in tow. 

Fueled by cokes and funnel cakes, 
we bounced around the beach pavilion 
trading a wad of tickets for thrills 

till, flushed, we faced our final ride – 
the ginormous log flume, 
which took six tickets 

or was it ten? We gave no thought, 
just hopped aboard a dugout log 
and off we floated, swept beyond 

the jostling crowd through a portal 
walled with wads of bubble gum – 
the scent of Juicy Fruit, chlorine, and fun. 

We went sliding down the sluiceway 
swirling into curves, swaying through 
a snake turn, sloshing round a bend 

which washed to the base of a towering mountain 
where gears engaged with mechanical thumps, 
shudders and clanks, the stink of grease 

on a slow rise to heights where young lives 
pause. We peered beyond our tiny selves 
to a miniature beach, the silent surf, 

the forever swath of water. 
The whole world lay at our feet 
so we let go our hold, small hands high 


the free fall 

took 

seconds 

the great splash 
even less. 
It was over in a childhood moment.



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