Riptide

It’s a misnomer, the experts say,
not a tide but a current, a long flowing
muscle of water with an iron grip

and the bone-chilling message
that you’re in the wrong place
at the wrong time —

like the moment when you wake
to find yourself in bed
with someone you don’t know

or when you realize the person
you’re dealing with is not only
angry, but armed.

By the time you understand
what’s happening, you’re already
in over your head.

You can’t give in and it’s futile
to fight back. If no one can
pull you out, try to save yourself

with an oblique approach —
appear to go with the flow, but
angle slowly toward the shore.

The water won’t easily give you up,
its hold like the fear that rips away
all you know, all that came before

this flash of clarity in which you see
that almost everything in your life —
except your life — can be let go,

that leaves you reeling, and if lucky,
on your knees in the sand
gasping, grateful.