as being similar to a tide and the sea.
A parallel can be drawn, this means,
between the oceans of the world, and me.
Life starts out with the infant's first breath
As the new tide starts with water's turn
Building life slowly so far from death
Experience and knowledge, so much to learn
With boundless enthusiasm of the child,
Tide rushes into each entrance and shore.
Investigating and analysing each feature un-filed.
Swirling and twirling, searching for more.
Turbulence and trauma of the growing inrush,
Restless adolescence changing the score.
Rationality and reason abandoned, faces aflush.
Waves, bursting and breaking over rocky shores.
Quietly flowing into spaces, seeking involvement.
Adulthood arrives providing welcome relief.
Nature and relationships and total commitment
Expanses and environs filling, contacts less brief.
Romance and marriage top the agenda
Hugging the earth with love's sweet embrace
Clinging to each shoreline, feature of splendour
Wherever the seawaters swirl, rip and race
With maturity comes Man's ultimate perfection
The tide is now high and peaks at its crest
Traffic is busy, ships and boats coming and going
Swimmers and surfers there's no time to rest.
Life seems so busy with tide at high levels
Endless responsibilities pulling all ways.
Constant demand and pressure dishevels
No sign of relief at this time of day.
With the tide turning to the outward repletion,
Time to reflect on achievements now past.
Retracting waters revealing jobs completion.
Exposing the tide's efforts, time racing so fast.
The end is in view, tide ready to change
Time to review the efforts now done
A measure of tide's success to arrange
How does it justify the race it has run?
Life cycle is completed and now looking back
All that is left of our tides mighty furore
Is a single line printed in a used Almanac
And smooth damp sand on a forgotten shore.
So think about your one and only life tide
And how you will live it on god's sweet earth
Don't waste a minute of the gift of the ride
And think on how you will judge life's worth.
By Peter Hurst
By Peter Hurst
