When the tide comes in
I used to stand at the edge of the sea at night, watching the waves crash in. I would stand there, my bare feet getting wet, as I waited for the sunrise. And when the sun finally came up, I sat down in the swells, my body rising each time a new wave came in. Later the tide came in, and with it came many tiny dead fish. I did not know what kind they were, but there were hundreds of them. They were only a few inches long. In the early morning the tide came, carrying its burden, and I would walk up and down the beach, stepping on these dead fish, breaking their already useless spines.