checking into another Marriott

checking into another Marriott

The hotel lobby plays on repeat a scene

of blue-green waves exploding on sea-side cliffs

like party poppers, confetti riddling the air

in an ocean celebration.

                                       He's seen

it many times: The way one wave will drift

back into another like shifting sands to share

the honor of hitting the cliff another time,

another time, and always another time,

as if the communal act of wrecking rock

in rhythmic rolls were its God-commissioned mission.  

But this time, standing in the too-long line
of automated businessmen in suits
who shift their weight and check their watches and roll
their eyes exactly like they were programed to,

he watches the automated lobby loop

and he cannot help but notice the fact

that rock, the hardest of natural substances,

is bound with time to chip and break away

when exposed for long enough to this endless act –

no wonder he and you and I, of substance
less strong than stone, know all too-well the way

the daily waves of life begin to take their toll.