on summer days
my uncle made
matchstick and paper boats
to float
on breezy bird bath currents
he was always smiling
but he wandered away
into the gloom
of the shuttered house
into darkness
where i overheard his story
told to my father
in faltering words
of shells
and bullets
and mud
and fear
and rotting feet
and friends
hung
like rung out washing
dying on the wire
i saw an old man
tears rolling down
a deep lined face
unashamedly
crying
shells
After the Storm
A storm was above and the wind was intense,
Rattling resistant windows,
It battered against the glass,
Salt patina crazed, obscuring the view.
The sea wall boomed, a dark drum.
The rocks, veiled by mussel shell
Opening wide to the tide,
Lay hidden beneath the wild surface
Of broiling and tumbling water
Turned in a pool of cross currents
The fog horn sang out
Above the deep throated echo of sirens
Who lure sailing men to their sea graves.
The tides of the turn leave us debris,
Strange treasures with rope and mast beams,
Blue glass rolled smooth by long tides,
Smashed shells and well polished pebbles.
Fragments of cuttlefish bone.
After the storm we gather them home
To make decorative frames for our mirrors
All our mirrors face out to the ocean.
Wind chimes of shells hang in the light.
Cuttlefish carved into faces unknown
Hang from blue string on our walls.
The storm did no damage at all.
The Sea
watching the sea
as it rises and falls
always awaiting the seventh
the rock pools are flooded
deep water drums
as each wave hits them again
the green at the heart of the wave
as it curls in the sun
and comes crashing down
fading, dying, it washes the shore
white frothing bubbles of foam
leaving smooth darkened sand in its wake
the line of white shells and pebbles
defines and records the retreat
and, for a time, holds the imprint
of my feet as i walk away
love, like the ocean, is endless
life and death on the tide
makes the cycle complete
and the loving more sweet
The Dreaming Path 