How the clouds hung on the horizon off the water and made two lines, I thought they were grinding their teeth. All the mountains ground down from the pressure of the sky pushing on them and the earth, where they could not stay forever. All the mountains ground down to sand and what remains of them, for dreamers to run their hands through…to lose themselves in the steady rhythm of the tide, to hope for the moon when the sun goes down and marvel on how it makes the waves bejeweled, how the moon holds no light of its own but just reflects it, and brings a sense of cold or company, depending on your point of view…I longed to go back to the coast, I thought of it all…thousands of birds released like souls to spill out through the sky, I wanted to go back and let go, for a time.
Photo by Loren Chasse, Oil City, WA (July, 2015)
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Categories: prose
Bill Pearse 
Excellent post.
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Thank you friend! Bill
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Not sure where your true Pacific Coast love lies, but mine is at Cannon Beach, in sight of Haystack Rock, on a grey, blustery day, walking barefoot in the surf. My love for grey, drizzly days along the Oregon Coast… living inland is difficult.
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Mine is on the peninsula near the Hoh rain forest, where the Blue glacier flows into the Hoh river and the ocean. Can’t wait! Thanks for sharing your scene too; I was there in February I think. Good color palette, you got it Justin. Bill
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If you get the chance Justin, I have a series of posts planned this week from the Pacific beach, Washington coast. Perhaps some vicarious living for you, inlanders. 🙂 Bill
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Loving the rhythm of this and the descriptons of course. The clouds grinding their teeth and the mountains becoming sand for the dreamers. Lovely Bill
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Hi Lynn, thank you. Was thinking about you with this David Mitchell book I’m reading, Bone Clocks. Loving it. Are you familiar? It reminds me of your style at times, and it’s so deliciously dark and unusual.
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I’m not familiar yet, though funnily enough, that book is on my TBR pile at the moment. I know that his writing is very imaginative and a bit off the wall – he wrote The Cloud Atlas too I believe. He’s written a ‘sort of’ sequel, Slade House, which I fancy just as much if not more. Thank you for the kind comparison – deserved or not! Still reading Justin Cronin’s The Passage (dystopian future, vampires created in a lab) which is highly enjoyable, though similarly dark of course. Ah, for those dark byways 🙂
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So you’ve read Slade House and Cloud Atlas and prefer the former? Wow! Cloud Atlas was one of my favorites of recent years so I’ll be excited to read Slade House. It’s a sad thing, Red Bull and Vodka. I guess that’s this generation’s “Wine Coolers,” as that’s what I was brought up on when I was too young to drink. Sigh. It all starts with an innocent enough piece of candy…and then you wake up and there’s a witch squeezing your arms, seeing if you’re fat enough yet to cook.
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No, haven’t read any of David Mitchell’s books yet, though I’ll be interested to when I get further down my TBR pile! So you loved Cloud Atlas? It’s sounds like one that twists your brain into a pretzel shape, with its convoluted plotlines 🙂 They used to have a thing called ‘alcopops’ here – still do I think. Basically alcohol that’s made to taste like kids’ soda. Lure the teens in with those and they’ll be hooked for life. It was good old cider in my day. Or whatever we could sneak from my parents’ drinks cabinet, mainly creme de menthe, cherry brandy or advocaat, the triumvirate of the 1970s drinks cabinet!
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Love this! 🙂
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Thanks my friend! Glad you stopped by. Bill
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