BELOW JEFFERS' HOUSE
From: SICILICONIA (Beehive, 1995)

You return again to the beach below Jeffers' house
in the early afternoon as the tide rises towards you,
walking the large-grained sand giving way below you,
gathering small shells in a ziploc bag someone discarded.

You watch the advancing tide bring hammered silver sea
closer to your feet by the minute & idly calculate whether
it will reach you by sunset, the hour you came to see here,

watching a rock with a pointed head, its broken-nosed face
scowling seaward as clouds obscure the sun. Between
your fingers you hold a translucent pebble at focal length
changing your depth of field like an infrangible stone host.

[24 APR 95 Carmel Point]