20 minute lifetime in Tide Pools

Eliot's Dry Salvages dives into the depths of the sea, past creatures we know nothing about, it washes us up onto the shores of a distant beach, a tropical isle, an iceberg. But in one moment and one pool, it shows us a glimpse into itself:

"The sea is the land's edge also, the granite

Into which it reaches, the beaches where it tosses

Its hints of earlier and other creation:

The starfish, the horseshoe crab, the whale's backbone;

The pools where it offers to our curiosity

the more delicate algae and the sea anemone." (lines 16-21)

This look into the tide pool, and area that is washed over continuously, always changing is a time trap. Low and high tide happen everyday. It is what surfers use to plan their waves, it is attached to the moon, and helps wash away abandoned sandcastles, as well as destroy ones in progress. The tide is a life in itself.  

Laguna Beach Tide Pools

Growing up around the ocean, I learned about the tide pools and the life that lives in these pockets of oceanic evolution.  When the tide would go out, the kiddies would rush in, peering into the crystal clear portals, involving themselves in the life that survived the rushing waves. And then, POOF, the kiddies must rush away from the deadly tide. Then, back out! The kiddies rush back in and find the pool they were exploring to look completely different. In a matter of moments the tide pool is changed, a lifetime of 20 minutes, waking up to find something completely different. 

I love tide pools and find myself getting lost in them even hear in Montana, dreaming of what life would be like to live by the mercy to the tide. I get lost in my dreams blocking out the now, and entering into my mind, my memories, my imagination, my 20 minute lifetime.

~L.