The Weight of the Tide

The ocean does not ask for permission. It arrives. It retreats. It leaves behind the debris of a thousand forgotten things, smoothed by salt and time until they are no longer what they were. We stand at the edge, watching the water erase the lines we have drawn in the sand. We think we are permanent. We think our footprints will hold.

But the tide is a patient teacher. It strips away the edges. It turns the heavy into the light. It turns the solid into the ghost. We are left with only the rhythm, the steady pulse of coming and going, until the distinction between the shore and the sea begins to blur. We are not the observers of the water. We are the water itself, waiting to be pulled back into the deep.

What remains when the water finally stops moving?

Karthick Saravanan has captured this quiet surrender in his image titled A Surf of Grey Men. The sea and the shore have found a common language here. Does the water hold the memory of what it has touched?