—from All the Way Through
Gulls
and cormorants scrape a paper sky,
shriek above seas marbled with veins of foam
that chide and hiss the shoreline. A bell buoy clanks
in slinking mist – distance disappearing.
Plovers peep along the rim of sand and sea.
Rain later today, but we expect that – know that just beyond
what we can see is another storm. We wait –
watch the haze bloom lighter, brighter
before a surge of gray spools through, thunder offshore.
A gust brushes ghostly fingers across the strand.
Closer. Then rain pummels what’s left
of blue haw, sea oats, smacks the dunes, the boardwalk.
Nature still in control here, at the edges of a continent
changing.
