This Beauty is Soft

(An image I shot in Carmel, California.)

This beauty is soft -- as if music and wood,
agate, cloth, wheat, peaches the light shines through
had made an ephemeral statue.
And now she sends her freshness out, against the waves.

The sea dabbles at those tanned feet, repeating
their shape, just imprinted in the sand.
And now she is the womanly fire of a rose,
the only bubble the sun and the sea contend against.

Oh, may nothing touch you but the chilly salt!
May not even love disturb that unbroken springtime!
Beautiful woman, echo of the endless foam,

may your statuesque hips in the water make
a new measure -- a swan, a lily --, as you float
your form through that eternal crystal.

-Neruda