On old Cape Cod

Chapter 36: The Smile Of The Sea

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About This Book

A collection of lyrical poems that celebrates and mourns a coastal landscape through images of dunes, marshes, sea, winds, birds, flowers, lighthouses, shipwrecks, and changing seasons. The work blends close natural observation with wistful memory and maritime lore, moving between quiet descriptive pieces and dramatic evocations of storms and loss. Recurring motifs such as salt, sand, driftwood, and light bind domestic scenes and seafaring sketches to themes of transience, rootedness, and the consoling, restorative power of place.

The Smile Of The Sea

O the sun’s molten gold seems to spatter and spill

O’er the wavelets so dazzlingly bright,

As they dance to the songs of the sandpiper’s shrill

With their numberless sparkles of light.

For the languorous winds with their deft fingers press

Those wrinkles of sapphire and flame,

And the fires they enkindle all surge to express

A shout of exultant acclaim.

How they twinkle and glitter like sparks from the steel

While the gilded foam chuckles with glee,

Till all nature, attuned to the rapture they feel

Seems aglow with the smile of the sea.