printable version PDF version

Sea and Rain
by lucy Sunday, Apr 1 2018, 2:47am
international / poetry / post

it’s raining/pouring by the shore
barnacles and other fastened shell-life
on the rocks perplex as salt water
is replaced by fresh rain,
they close and clamp tightly onto the rocks
waiting for the salt water to save them,
i could almost hear them screaming

though secretly they wish to be free
of all the mediums that bind them

what do the little animals in these shells do,
release their grip and wash away with the tide
while assaulted by threatening rain water
or take a chance and hope that releasing their grip
would return them to familiar spaces?

people walk along the rocks prying these little shells/animals
from the rocks, a tasty treat for some tho most give no thought
to the plight of these little creatures -- it pays to be mobile it seems

waves crash onto the rocks and wash a careless gatherer
into the ocean, screaming and waving
as he is tossed like a cork in the sea --
tho he gives no thought to the little animals screaming silently
in his hessian bag

the storm now violent his associates too frightened to
assist and so a human drowns in an environment
unsuited for the species --
survivors crowd together by the shore bound by their guilt
and cowardice while the cockles they have collected
scream from the pain of separation from their homes

across the ocean a war rages driven by those that profit therefrom,
the casualties scream from the separation of their lives, homes
and families
but the disruptors continue to drop their bombs and pry
the life from many a helpless person/victim

the floating drowned man begins to slowly sink
beneath the waves while the others watch helplessly
from the rocky shore

in the township a fishwife plying her trade through the streets, sings,
'cockles and muscles, alive, alive ho!’