Someone built these benches for the view, then left. Now they hold the grey afternoon in place, a row of empty seats facing a sea that no longer performs. The light is flat, the tide unhurried, the promenade swept clean of footsteps. Each bench leans toward the water as if still listening, still expecting. But the only sound is the wind moving through the railings, and the slow erosion of an afternoon that refuses to end. To sit here would be to wait for nothing in particular, which is, perhaps, the purest way to wait at all.

#bench