I always wondered what would be on that obsidian beach.

A couple of dead fish perhaps, 

maybe some washed up driftwood, 

splinters packed with starless void.

Imagine my surprise, 

as the pigment of my tan skin was enveloped by the dark sand of the beach, 

I spied a goddess. 

Her long fingers traced fragments of what looked like a woman's sculpted face, 

her warm sunbeam palm held smooth stone lips and two tearful midnight eyes 

connected by a porous cheek.

The stone it was carved from,

like the beach, was a light consuming black

and devoured her form 

solidifying it.

The stone drank her silver tears,

which flowed like a tap from her shard blue eyes.

I watched as she hunched over the face, 

sobs wracking her body like the rough surf that maliciously pounded the beach. 

The waves devoured

      more 

            and 

               more 

of the inky lifeless sand.

The salty unforgiving sea was coming for the goddess, 

coming for her slowly eroding silk dress that flickered like light from a projector,

coming for her long thin body that curled protectively around the half-face,

coming to finish the eclipse that had begun at her desperate arrival.

The serf licked her feet, 

washed over her heels, 

beat her calves, 

And light left each body part, 

slowly. 

All she did was fold closer to the half-face and whimper, 

more deathrattle than stricken cry.

Warm lips pressed against cold dead ones

The Dead 

                                                                                                                        The Dying.

I watched, 

      I 

        Watched,

              I couldn't do it.

                               “STOP!” 

I cried at her, 

                      “FOR GOD’S SAKE STOP. 

                                                              PLEASE.” 

Two blue swerling irises met mine, 

“Dear mortal, enlighten me as to why I should get to live when I caused this?” 

her pale fingers slid to reveal the tearful eyes of the stone half-face,

“Why? Must you mortals meddle in things that do not concern you.

Why do I let you?”

I clambered over the glassy stone I had been watching from and crossed the 

lengthless

gap between us.

Goddess and mortal. 

Sand and sea. 

Dead and dying.

My ash tan hands grabbed a cooling pale arm, 

a violent tug pulled a body from its grave.

The dying star 

screeched, 

writhed,

clawed, 

at the raven particles of the 

Midnight Beach.

She split ears with her anguished inhuman pleading 

“MSOSORRYMSORRYTAKE METAKEMEPLEASEPLEASEMTOOLATE P L E A S E” 

I heaved our bodys’ onto the green grass of another world, 

I felt her arm 

disappear

from my hands. 

Solid to gas,

her charcoal legs turned back to a pale flicker of light and her one hand -still material and holding onto the half-face- floated into the sun warmed air. 

She was gone.

I now know what the Midnight Beach holds,

who its patrons seek to reach;

where ebony swirls meet toned grays,

where salty eyes always see.