Sift

Distinctly the pad of her hand

the inside of her thumb

tapping like a tambourine

white dust exploding upward

each solid strike

and dare ask

why do you do that Grandma?

She liked wearing an apron,

To make it all smooth and loose

or something like that

she said.

The white powder 

was not flour

on my parents' kitchen counter

back then the oven made

TV dinners 

better than the microwave.

And as I sift

through the coarse grains 

of the collapsed sandcastle 

of my own making

where I grew into

adding on and adding on

but built too close 

to the tideline-

there was nothing 

softer than flakes of carbon and gold

no solid memories endured 

the crashing

like white shells

of me. 

Painting by Granville Redmond, 'Talk at the beach' c. 1931 in Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

Still life (goes on)

The canvas bled

the day we wed

all color

draining 

the ocean

as a witness 

softly eroding

the world under (our) toes

the rain holds its breath

heaven knows

white noise

soothes, 

sometimes crashing, breaking-

promises, hearts 

sharp words into mulched glass

Barefoot

I am

slipping away

and alone at the altar

Only a silhouette

before the sun

blinding me 

as the man of my dreams

Sandman, Shadowman

roll back into

the fog bank offshore

Off the shelf

broken sand dollars

lie still and stacked

unspent

only I notice the omen

among the flowers

and painted pictures and poses, 

as if 

a ring

holds on

to promises 

or runs 

thin 

and over diluted...

Only cycles remain.

I left the return

of Spring. 

He was gone,

long before

the painting

finished. 

Photo credit: me of me

Erasure

There was a line

on the shore that clear day

We both knew

where to stand

Once

the tide came to meet us

in the middle of taking in

both sides, the ways of life

varied as the grains

all touching one another

in such a clutching way

that the differences and space

only demarcate

the same

Way

these lines cross.

Painting by Sydney Starr, 'On the Shore' c. 1900 in Public Domain. 

Flash point

When ideas
hit air
they turn from blue to red,
originating from the short wavelength
inside
to form long low rollers of crimson tide
depositing turbid drops
of inklings.

The idea
tries to crystalize
along the smooth open facet
trying to adhere to open wounds
only to become
solid and reformed.
Ages ago,
raw material was re-collected and
re-presented as pure, a commodity
of our invention.

A single blinding glimmer,
like a square grain of sand
may find itself
a fully rounded pearl
over time and under toes
we find this same potential
scattered across elemental
boundaries.

Carbon in cubes
could become a diamond,
coal, a mote of dust, or Us
bearing the weight
of six million atmospheres
while making light
of such intense pressure
to create beauty
from conception.


Painting by Karel Dujardin (1622-1678) , 'Allegory' c. 1663 in Public Domain. 

Beading

The wind breaks
promises

and I storm off
in bitter retreat,

sucking out the sour
isolation...

And the shoreline
waves
recognizing its relationship
with the timeline

inevitable as the tides turn
over

Revealing
what has been there
and who is dancing at the edge
unafraid
of falling in

for a pearl.

It comes in waves;
pain, sleep, sound, this feeling
the crashing is closer

becoming brackish
tumultuous and turbid for a trace
of gold
in every full glass
we see through

The warm breeze
blew away
our differences.

How easily mist
the rising and falling
of all things

may be made
more
than solid or whole,
as in part

of us
is always drowning

and becoming
one and the same.


Painting by Władysław Wankie (1860-1925) 'Fisherwomen on the shore', [Public domain].

Sure line

With these borrowed hands still unrecognizable
I have learned to poke and preen this vessel
taking exploratory measures
only within reach

None of the pieces fit together
like hands holding hands holding hands
This is what I got

I need these as is,
collectively
to see, together,
to gather
keepsakes

this is why the shells scatter near the jetty
by the sea
by the tide, from sand, into sand, by grain
by the hand full, glass full, by the hour

which explains why we collect empty dollars
one day,
we may fit in
beautifully.


Painting by Julian Ashton, 'Summer morning, 1899' [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

She seas you

dreamt that you brought me
a bag of sand
for my hourglass

the gold flecks sparked, alit by
the sunlight in your eyes, whereby
the ocean leaked

and the bag was empty...

certain it was you.




Painting by George Bellows (1917) in [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

From Wails to the Shuddering Sea

When I wonder

do we first think

we Are

welcome to the world?

From the abyss

of a watery womb

we hear

outside

of Us

we know

when words fail

we wail

upon arrival

into blinding light

from maternal night

Immobile and trapped

in our scaly shells

worn by the tides

we call Time

we wither

from glass to grain

too small to complain

anymore

utter

nonsense

We forget

Shards and slices

pieces of Us

that cut to the race

humanity

drops of sea

expire We

at the finish line

of memory

shuddering 

blindly

in our final victory

drowned 

in revelry.

Image By Koga Harue, Koga Harue, 1929 (died in 1933) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.