18. Night Swim at the Dolphin Club

Night Swim at the Dolphin Club



Cars backed up to the Golden Gate, bumper to bumper;
Drivers rubberneck through windshields, curiously;
Is it a suicide? Do we have a jumper?
No? Then let’s blame the Governator, spuriously.

The sun is in front of me, descending, blinding;
I’m stuck in rush-hour traffic when I should be unwinding.
This is not right, not how life was meant to be.
I make a U-turn – sheepish, hurried, hot;
Is this too drastic? Have I cut the Gordian knot?

At the Dolphin Club white painted boards catch the last of the light.
This rickety wooden building has sheltered shivering bodies for over a century.
What does it represent? Escape from the quotidian 9 to 5 penitentiary?

I stride out between twin piers,
Without the wetsuit which members frown upon,
And dive into the icy water, transfixing like sharpened spears;
But for Dolphins this cold is the sine qua non.

Just get to the second buoy,
Then the pain will subside.
But the water is black,
I can’t see my arms.
Aim for the flag,
Look for the lights.
But what if I get lost?
Can I swim by the stars?
Would I recognize Orion?
Whose is that bark?
Is it a sea-lion?
Do they feed in the dark?
Are there jellyfish?
Are there eels?
What about those amorous seals?
What of the sharks?
Do they enter the bay?
Be still, mind!
This is not a game I want to play.


It is dark now, too dark to see,
And my goggles steam up, annoyingly.
But my breathing is regular, cyclical, strong,
And I feel that water is my element - here I belong.

The wind has died; the surface is glassy, flat.
Salt water washes away the day’s crust, the caffeine sweat, the cack.
My strokes come easily, epassyterotically;
Thoughts flow gently, hypnotically.

I swim back in beside the pier,
And emerge from the water like a primordial pioneer:
The first to stagger from that inky primal soup,
Bold leader of some prehistoric splinter group.

Memories of the day sloughed off like a second skin,
And the blood is coursing deep within.
My mind is clear and I survey the scene:
Dark sea, dark sky, and one grateful swimmer in-between.