Thickly settled

Photo of me sitting on the bench on the captain's deck of a catamaran, wearing a turquoise blue long-sleeve shirt over a white t-shirt, a pair of exercise capris pants, and barefoot. The sun is setting behind me.

We were bouncing over

the swells, standing

on the starboard bow

of a motoring catamaran

along the western coast of

Kauai, waves kicking

the boat, no longer kids

but we still feel like it

holding onto each other

these past thirty trips

around the sun

now a little thicker around

the middle than we were

tree trunks adding rings

each one showing

good years

hard ones too

No one tells us how

to grow old

how to inhabit this

changing flesh

that gives in to gravity

a little more each day

until resistance is futile

Maybe we thicken

so we can be something

someone can hold onto

have something

someone to hold on to

when life unsettles us

to have and to hold

like the old promise says

even if it's

ourselves