NOT FROM HAWAII
Privet! My name is Ivan Florence. I was born in Moscow and raised by the sea. I’ve been writing poems and novels; articles and essays about surfing for 7 years. I have mixed feelings when I write about myself a lot, but still I love the possibility to do this for Salt Water magazine.
Surfing is no longer just a sport for me. I think that it can be called art. Multifaceted and incomprehensible.
I like writing stories about waves, taking photo-notes and interviewing people involved in the surfing culture.
However, nothing pleases me more than the opportunity to be in the arms of the ocean. My connection with salt water is so strong that I cannot imagine life without waves, reefs and the smell of seaweeds.
To share my love for the great force of nature, I decided to convey the whole beauty of the ocean with the words that were written by my favorite poets.
***
Oh, why was I not born
As this blue wave?
I would have loudly tumbled
Under the silver moon;
Oh, I would have passionately kissed
The golden sand beneath me,
I would have haughtily despised
The untrusting canoe above me;
All that which brings pride to people
Would have been destroyed by my invasion;
And I would hold those who suffer
Close to my icy breast;
Then I would not fear hell's torments,
And I would not be seduced by heaven;
Only restlessness and coolness
Would be my eternal law;
I would not seek to forget everything
In a faraway northern land;
And from birth, I would be free
To live and end my life!
– Mikhail Lermontov
La Balada del agua del mar
The sea
Smiles from far off
Teeth of foam
Lips of sky.
What are you selling, muddy young woman?
With your breasts exposed?
Sir, I sell the water
Of the seas.
What are you carrying, dark youth
Mixed with your blood?
Sir, I carry the water
Of the seas.
These saline tears,
Whence do they come, Mother?
Sir, I weap the water
Of the seas.
Dear one; and this earnest
Bitterness – of what is it born?
Very bitter is the water
Of the seas.
The sea
Smiles from far off
Teeth of foam
Lips of sky.
– Federico García Lorca
Man and the Sea
Always, unfettered man, you will cherish the sea!
The sea your mirror, you look into your mind
In its eternal billows surging without end
And its gulfs are bitter, so must your spirit be.
You plunge with joy into this image of your own:
You hug it with your eyes and arms; your heart
Forgets for a time its noisy beat, becomes a part
Of a greater, more savage and less tameable moan.
In your own ways, you both are brooding and discreet:
Man, no one has mapped your chasm’s hidden floor,
Oh sea, no one knows your inmost riches, for
Your jealousy hides secrets none can repeat.
As the uncounted swarm of centuries gathers
You two have fought without pity or remorse, both
From sheer love of the slaughter and of death,
Oh, eternal wrestlers, oh, relentless brothers!
– Charles Baudelaire
Photographs by Anastasiya Sokolova
Surfers Roma Lavrov & Anais Pierquet
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