Point Dume

Third Place Poetry Winner

Point Dume

by Cori Morris


I took the leap
Not knowing
how or why I’d change.
I’d come back with tears in my eyes and
A longing that would never leave me.
I bought the tickets, I just knew it was right.
I knew I had to go,
I never questioned, nor considered
California.
I never thought about you,
until this land moved me to tears;
I was lifted
as if by an unearthly wind.
Growing there on the spot
Digging roots,
Laying ground,
Settling in,
To watch this sunset fade
A wash of emotion consumes me
I linger,
Looking back.
Watching the twilight rolling in,

The grass blowing gently,
As if waving me back.
I feel a great sadness, a longing.
I long not to leave this place ever again.
I want to explore it – catalog it.
Preserve it. Impress this memory, until I never, ever forget – what I felt here.
Where I once stood.
Its ever-present consciousness seeping its wild wisdom deep in the innermost cavities of my mind.
The longing grows, even as I turn away and walk away.
I keen holding back a cry.
This Point changed me.
I am different inside.
I couldn’t go,
But the flight was booked.
I felt like staying there forever. Locked in time,
I thought maybe I’d stop
Here and now and grow roots.
I was locked, floundering, overwhelmed by this ocean, by the sea that called my name.
I still feel nature calling me, I hear it every day.
I still hear the sounds of time thundering, consistently ever present, the real and the white so bright and full of promise.
I still feel that tide thudding in my chest.