Melanie

By Michael Roque

Every few years,

the 4 a.m. of my life eclipses forward motion.

My socked toes under Tel Aviv sheets,

sink into the sand

of my old Venice Beach—

and before me—

the finely designed bottle

I found on its shore

with a message inside

waiting to be read by the world.

Her time before living eyes—

brief.

I caught a mere glimpse

through multi-colored glass,

a sentence she wanted to speak.

With meaning at mind’s grasp—

rough hands smashed her to shards—

tossed her message into the ocean

to float above the abyss

from where she was born.

A human prophecy

unfulfilled—

the bottled illumination of 2005,

the lighthouse that signaled me in

from the storming tide of SoCal despair—

long dimmed in 2026.

Days by the thousands—

decades drizzle away

from the wild of her time

into the curated chaos of today.

The curved—

red-capped bottle.

The peeling—

dated label

of a sweet drink discontinued—

no longer on display.

Now a disintegrating scroll in the unknown—

Unread

off shore,

floating too far for human eyes to see.

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