I had a love hate relationship
with sandcastles.

On one hand, I thought they were
really, really cool.
I’d combine towers,
build walls, build moats,
imagine kings and knights and movie-lead heroes
to fight villains and monsters and pirates
and knights from other sandcastles
that lived further down the beach.
It was a fun hour or so,
a great creative expression while on a vacation.

But there was always the nagging thought
that, like all great civilizations,
my sandcastle could only last so long.
Not like the crayon drawings I made
(which would take years to lose)
all of my kings and knights and heroes
met swift ends under the foot of
a little brat, or quietly
when the tide came in.

I was my sandcastles’ only recordkeeper
and, for some reason, I never thought
to write any of it down.
And, try as I might,
all that I seem to remember now
was that they were a fun way
to spend an hour or so.