Sink or Swim
Do you remember how you learned to swim? Was it a gentle process, or did someone push you in?
(I won’t tell you the whole story of being pushed in when I was trying to learn to dive. It happened. I was terrified. It didn’t work, and I hit the water with a painful belly flop. I did learn, however, to avoid being near that person when it came to creating a safe space for myself.)
In general, I don’t believe in the push method. Someone could drown. Though, it is true that sometimes life itself pushes us, and then we’ve got to sink or swim. Whether or not we have developed resilience can determine the outcome.
If we’re not in sink-or-swim mode, we’ve got a lot of freedom for how to proceed. Maybe we get a joyful summer of learning to swim, like the child in Michael Simms’ “The Summer You Learned to Swim.” Maybe we even get to learn vicariously, as we find inspiration from someone else’s efforts, the way Michael learned from his child. It can be like this:
“The summer you learned to swim
was the summer I learned to be at peace with myself”
And this:
“you pushed off and swam to me and held on
laughing, your hair stuck to your cheeks—
you hiccupped with joy and swam off again.
And I dove in too, trying new things.
I tried not giving advice. I tried waking early to pray. I tried
not rising in anger. Watching you I grew stronger—
your courage washed away my fear.”
Try It: Sink or Swim Poetry Prompt
Recall a time when you had to sink or swim. How did you get to that juncture? Did you “survive” it? Or did it set you back? Or, recall a time when you learned to swim, either literally or figuratively, from watching someone else who inspired you. Use these memories to create a poem. Share it in the comments. We can’t wait to read!
Photo by Dmitry Limonov, Creative Commons, via Unsplash.
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Lindsey Cornett says
Thank you for the inspiration today!
Stepping into swimming pools
on August afternoons
I recall my grandfather’s death.
A nurse removed his dentures
to clear a path for the oxygen
his strangled lungs required.
Two uncles carried away the screen
from the sliding glass door, to lend a better view
of the grandkids in the pool.
On an earlier afternoon, he taught us to swim,
a worn brown leather belt
cinched around our waists.
Tugging us through chlorinated blue,
from shallow to deep and back,
until letting us loose.
I still feel the slip
of smooth fiberglass
beneath my wet and wrinkled feet.
L.L. Barkat says
Oh, Lindsey. A hard one. And, yet, good memories, too.
I especially like the “slip of smooth / fiberglass” as an image and how it captures so much of the other echoes of this poem in its small breath.
Bethany R. says
Lindsey, thank you for sharing this moving poem with us.
Joshua C. Frank says
Here’s mine, about someone else, but based on a true story:
The Ballad of the Heroic Mother
A toddler into water fell
And sank as quick as rock.
At nine feet deep, she couldn’t yell
Or jump or thrash in shock.
Her mother heard the splash portend
Her daughter’s water grave;
She dove into the pool’s deep end,
Her little girl to save.
She grabbed her daughter, held her tight,
And with a presto prayer
Sprang toward the shimmering sun of white
To give her girl some air.
She held her up while sinking down,
And knew to save her daughter
That she herself might well soon drown
So inched toward shallow water.
Seconds before her lungs gave out,
Her face felt heat and air.
Her feet on ground, she breathed a shout:
“Success!” An answered prayer!
The whole crowd cheered the mom en masse;
She gained a hero’s glory.
She told the public-speaking class—
I still think of the story.
First published in The Society of Classical Poets