Those Who Come, Those Who Stay

I have carried many names, though most people only know the one written on maps. Before maps, I was simply here. Before borders learned to argue with each other, before they cut the land into pieces and pretended the water would agree, I was already holding what humans could not.

I remember when hands first reached into me without ceremony. They did not call themselves fishermen then. They were only hungry. Hunger and gratitude were the same thing in those days.

People come to me now for different reasons. Beauty, they say. Peace. Escape. They stand at my edge and call me calm, as if calm were the same as empty. As if I have not spent centuries listening.

I am not silent. I am simply tired of speaking to those who arrive already planning their departure.

The ones who belong to me do not announce themselves. They come before the sun has fully remembered its name. Their feet know where to step without looking. Their hands move with a familiarity that cannot be taught. They do not ask me for answers. They ask me to hold what they are carrying.

I have taken grief without language. I have taken prayers pressed into palms and released only when no one was watching. I have taken ashes, though people pretend otherwise. I do not judge what is given to me. I only keep it.

Children learn my nature first with their bodies. They float before they understand fear. They laugh, then swallow water, then learn respect. They learn quickly that I am not cruel, but I am not careful either. I do not bend myself for anyone. I hold when I can. I release when I must.

Later, the visitors arrive.

They come from faraway places where water is framed and disciplined, where it is told what shape to be. They arrive with guides and schedules, with shoes made for walking but never for waiting. Many of them raise their phones before they raise their eyes. They speak of authenticity and healing, as if these were things one could collect and carry home.

Some step into me cautiously, surprised by my cold. They do not like how much listening is required. They do not stay long.

Once in a while, someone arrives who is known everywhere else.

The boats grow quieter when this one comes. Cameras hover, uncertain, then retreat. The face that has been everywhere suddenly belongs nowhere. Without the noise that usually follows them, the person becomes ordinary, which is the most frightening thing fame ever does to a human being.

This one comes early, before the others wake. They sit at my edge without performing. No assistants. No audience. When they finally speak, the words break apart halfway through the sentence. Their shoulders shake once, then again. No one records it. Even the birds look away.

I hold the sound of their breathing until it steadies.

They leave nothing behind but warmth, which fades quickly. People always do.

Not all visitors fail to listen.

Once, a woman from the north stayed longer than planned. She stopped asking what she should see and began noticing what was already there. A child swam beside her without asking permission. She learned his name and repeated it softly, as if it might dissolve if spoken too loudly. When she left, she did not look back. That is how I knew something had changed.

Not everything that is given to me is meant to be remembered.

There are nights when boats do not return. When the water closes quietly behind them and no one is left to argue with the dark. By morning, people gather at my edge and point, as if direction might undo what has already happened. They speak my name differently then. Softer. As if I have changed.

I have not.

I hold what I am given, whether it arrives wrapped in ceremony or silence. Humans want meaning where there is only continuation. They want someone to blame so they do not have to learn how fragile they are.

I do not teach them this. I simply remain.

Sometimes, at dusk, the air becomes almost reverent. Not because of prayer, but because everything pauses at once. Nets rest. Voices lower. Even the birds seem unsure whether to speak.

Humans mistake this for holiness.

What they feel is not divinity. It is alignment. A brief moment when nothing is resisting what it is.

These moments do not last. They are not meant to. But I have noticed that those who experience them leave differently. Slower. Quieter. As if something unnecessary has loosened its grip.

People think I am generous because I give them beauty. They are wrong. I am generous because I do not ask them to stay.

I have watched men arrive believing they would own what they touched. I have watched them leave lighter, or broken, or unchanged. I have watched women return after many years, standing quietly where they once ran. I have watched grief pass from mother to daughter without ever being named.

I keep none of their titles. I keep none of their fame. I do not remember who was followed and who was forgotten. I remember who listened.

I have watched empires imagine they were permanent. I have watched promises float briefly before sinking. I have watched plastic outlive prayer. I have watched men speak of progress while their shadows grew thinner.

None of this surprises me anymore.

What still unsettles me is how easily humans mistake movement for meaning.

They come believing they will take something with them—clarity, peace, a story polished enough to tell later. Most leave with photographs instead. Proof that they were here, even if they were not present.

Others stay longer. Long enough to grow quiet. Long enough to stop asking what I am and begin noticing who they are when no one is watching. These are the ones who frighten themselves a little. These are the ones who do not thank me.

Gratitude, I have learned, is loud. Understanding is not.

When they leave, I do not follow them. I do not miss them. Missing is a human luxury.

I remain—not as witness, not as keeper, not as teacher—but as water.

Some come believing they will take something with them.

Others stay long enough to become part of what is kept.