We visited the hotel
and it was a tombstone now.
We had stayed as
sunburnt sunglass laden
tourists when it was
beachside property,
and then it was swallowed by
the dunes and became a relic.
The tour guide made
up something about it
featuring a ballroom
and library—as if it was
a palace—but I laughed
because it had been a few decades
but I remembered the
ballroom had been
converted to storage and
single rooms. Things become
more glamorous when they
are relics, the palace the relic
of consumerism and sunburn,
the empty perfume relic of
her wilting like a flower, only
not so sweetly, the stack of papers
a relic of his devotion, the grey
half moons under his eyes and
the rivers bulging under his skin.
I think the manager still lives on the
top floor, and laughs to see us
trying to climb a wave of sand,
trying to convince ourselves that
the past was beautiful, simply
because it is
gone.