Honestly, I never would have thought that a comparison of the sea to a book could work quite this well. I’m reading this poem over and over and over again, and it’s pulling my thoughts towards finding a beach to pitch my tent this weekend…
(note: more of Claire’s poetry can be found here).
Aquinnah
by Claire Åkebrand
Midnight rain gusts against the tent’s drape.
What height might the already tall waves since noon
have reached. No light illuminates the felted seascape.
Just a dim glow of froth, and dune,
waves all ruffled up pages of a book
no one has entirely read. How the sea pines
for a reader. I hear her slinging her hooks.
No one walks the shallows at this hour. Her brine
would tow me quickly to her heart. What sea
creatures might gape for me there.
Drowsing off, I’m swallowed, and reeled
again and again by the wake and snared
to a place each human has been before
to find nothing but the sallow ocean floor.
