Third Coast Woman

The upper half of her ample body lay stretched for 150 miles from the hill country to the coast where her broad hips sank into the liminal beach sands bordering the gulf, and the wetness between her thighs sweetened the currents of the waters there. Her legs, spread wide, extended out to the deep blue drop beyond the sand bars and formed protective jetties that broke the power of the surf, preserving the land against the sea’s encroachment. Her rounded breasts softened by the years of suckling her many children are the limestone hills that replace, in this time, the once mighty mountain range that was slowly eroded by her rain and wind children. From her headlands pour the rivers, her tears, her laughter, the stories she tells her people by their campfires in the night.