Salt on the Skin

The air before a storm tastes of iron and wet stone. I remember standing on a shoreline where the wind felt like a rough wool blanket dragged across my shoulders, heavy and damp. There is a specific rhythm to the sea when it meets the land—a rhythmic thrumming that vibrates through the soles of your feet, traveling up your shins until your entire skeleton hums in sympathy with the tide. It is not a sound you hear with your ears; it is a pressure, a cold, stinging spray that leaves a fine crust of salt on your lips, tightening the skin until you feel brittle and new. We are mostly water, and perhaps that is why we ache to stand where the solid earth finally gives way to the chaotic, churning grey. When the water retreats, does it take a piece of our own restlessness with it, or does it leave us heavier, anchored by the weight of the deep? What remains in the body when the tide pulls away?

Jens Hieke has captured this raw, rhythmic pulse in his beautiful image titled Groyne. It feels as though the salt spray is still hanging in the air, waiting for us to step into the cold. Can you feel the vibration of the water against the wood?