Sun, melons, and shucking oysters by the sea—🍉🌞🦪⛱️
Get outta here winter. Slink away.
This is about poetry.
I love the way writing untangles things. How words hold weight. How sometimes, the only way to see yourself clearly is to spill your thoughts onto a page.
And yet, we don’t always write to capture something concrete. Sometimes we write words down without realizing why. I’ve filled pages with tangled feelings, only to return later and feel the weight of the words without recognizing the person who wrote them. That’s the thing—it can reveal us in ways we don’t expect.
Like the word purpose.
Purpose is a word that carries weight. It can be lofty, dreamy, comforting—or unattainable, stifling, dark. We spend lifetimes trying to define it, shape it, live up to it. Is it a job? A family? A cause? A paycheck? A law? A high school sport? It’s supposed to be what drives us every day.
During COVID, I decided that my purpose would be something small—making sure at least one person felt seen by the end of the day. It wasn’t about a career or achievement. It was about something human. It took the pressure off, made purpose feel less like a burden and more like a quiet act of noticing.
But even then, it was still a lot.
Purpose: The reason for which something is done, created, or exists.
That’s a lot to put on ourselves.
Finding a purpose. It’s driven into us as something we must earn or chase—a career, a cause, a legacy. But I think we should change how we hear the word purpose. What if purpose isn’t something to achieve, but something to notice?
Maybe instead of searching for purpose, we should be searching for essence.
Essence is lighter. Less about productivity, more about presence. It’s not about defining what we do. It’s about honoring what we already are.
For example, there’s no purpose in being at the beach, and that’s why to me it feels so right. It’s just essence—the honeyed warmth of the sun spilling over my skin, the salt air curling into my hair, the lazy hush of the waves pressing against the shore like a whispered secret. Time slows. My body softens.
I wade in slowly, letting the cold water kiss up my legs, a shiver of contrast against the heat lingering on my skin. The sand shifts beneath me, velvet-soft and ever-changing, sinking slightly as if pulling me deeper into the present. I stretch out on a sun-warmed towel, the scent of coconut oil and sea spray settling around me, my skin tight with salt, my fingers sticky from the ripest summer tomato—red and bursting, its juice slipping down my wrist as I take a bite of the perfect sandwich. The crunch of crisp lettuce, smooth mayo, the buttery softness of good (gluten free) bread, the cool, citrusy kiss of orange juice sangria washing it all down.
I don’t think about why I’m at the beach, because the beach doesn’t ask me to. It just lets me exist, in salt and light and stillness. And I think that’s what essence is—the things that let us exist without explanation.
Essence is what lingers. Purpose moves you forward, but essence roots you in moments. Let purpose guide your mind—chasing interests, reaching goals. But let essence shape your life—the way you love, the way you pause, the way you feel when the sun hits your skin just right.
So, here is a poem about 🍉🌞🦪⛱️
Sun, melons, and shucking oysters by the sea
Your eyes hold the tide
The calm way you take in a vast, shifting world
Holding still in its rise and retreat
Washed ashore for sweet moments
Like soft, sun-ripened melons,
Like briny oysters unearthed
To reset your tongue, your pulse, your breath.
I believe in the sand squished beneath your toes
And the way the waves make room for new paths
every day.
