Silence
by Julien DuBrow

About the author

Julien holds a Master’s degree in theology and is a spiritual director and artist. She lives in the Bay area with her husband and two dogs.

The child had wandered off down the beach

Behind the jutting rocks

Where tide pools sucked fish,

Until waves carried them away.

She pressed her feet in warm, wet sand,

Stared at tiny grains

Like painted salt,

Like stars blotting out the black.

Then the man came over the rock wall,

His naked body brown,

His penis like seaweed.

He said, “Where’s your mom?”

She looked around, didn’t know.

The sand in her hand scattered in the wind.

Silence. The man was deciding.

He knelt brushing

Her hair out of her eyes.

“She’s over there,” he said,

pointed back to black rocks.

The girl turned and ran.

No one asked her where she’d been.

They lay on their back, eyes closed in the sun.