By the Sea

At the Beach

It’s been a while, and a long weekend to boot. In sum: got some sun, traipsed some beaches, wondered and waxed philosophic and photographic somewhere between the trees and the waves, and tasted of the delicious sensation known as BBQ. It was a long weekend, but a good one, and I can honestly say it was the most relaxing I’ve had a good long while, even if I was still running all over the place.

I get the wanderlust, you know?

Big Red

C’est la vie, though, as they say. To those Americans among my readership, here’s hoping the fourth of July (the USA’s Independence Day, for those of you not up-to-the-know on your history of the land of the stars and stripes) was a delightful blend of summer warmth and rapturous relaxation with those you hold most dear. Plus, if you got to see some of the shiny explosions that were lighting up the country’s night sky, all the more power to you.

What’s the night without a little boom? Whether it’s a spiritual or a physical or even a metaphorical boom, well, that’s really up to your preference. I’m just the humble fellow wishing you a good time, regardless.

But I digress…and supposing you One Stoppers have sifted through my silliness and well-wishes, I’d like to kick off my return and the week with my latest submission to One Stop Poetry’s One Shot Wednesday, a tanka titled: “By the Sea“…

Sunlight on white sand

Refracted in pillowed veils

Hiding sand castles

Bronzed amidst unyielding tides

Sprouted in short-short visions.

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Elemental Elation

Bear me up

Rustling cavalcade of coalescing

Music rush, on tempo speed

These breaths across my skin.

The harmony

Of your exultation

Gives me strength

Beneath my wings.

–

Crystal flow

Caress and coax

The resolution of my being,

Dive down into the deep.

Crash upon

The shores of apathy

And stir upon us yet the storms

That break inequity.

–

Quick-step

Quivering motions elate

To find the kiss, the touch of motion

In the sensuous sway of your dance.

No hands

Could ever hold thy hips

This beat, thunder of thy solitary

Moment, unbidden.

–

Bastion

Rampart revelry of life

Shield yet the passions of hope,

A dream of majesty.

Resolute

Mother-being enfold

The world in thy being:

Ground this flighty soul.

* For the latest Monday Poetry Potluck!

Beneath the Waves

Photo by Chris Galford

White water rush,

cool crystal commence

the crashing of my flesh

subverted in the waves

of vigorous caress,

still on, this mountain roar–

a silent stillness, in the drink.

Yet the Sea

Photo by Adam Dustus

They say the sky’s the limit

But the ocean, yet your sky

Mirror, mirror

Glittering bright

The crystals on horizon blue

The winds upon your back.

Rest now ye weary masts

Float awhile upon your dreams

Soon enough the current

Will carry you home again.

This is a poem for One Shoot Sunday, from the poets that brought you the ever-popular One Stop Poetry. The poem is written in response to the picture prompt posted above. Picture prompt is by Adam Dustus.

Morning Elegance

Star-crossed lovers lie

Snoring in the sand

Waiting on the rose-tipped caress

Of dawn’s fair light,

But the sun catches like

Little crystals in the waters

And they are sleeping through

The glitter and the glare.

The runner’s smile

Warms the streets as they rise

Amidst the shadows of red glare—

Early to rise

And early to rest,

Not like the frantic typing around

Those battered tables—

Early to rise

And early to work,

A desperate cry for more coffee is

As much a sign as these

Gleaming starlets

Carried in the sunlight,

Shimmering in the haze.

Dew drops beneath the leaves,

The covers dip beneath the waves

Of majesty and trees

Swaying in the breeze.

Birdsong, so ponderous in sleep

Uplifted in the daylight—

Just keep away those woodpeckers.

The body screams,

The mind elates

To greet this

Morning Elegance.

Blackest Blood

Black blood breathe

beneath the rocky deep

burn bright and high

waves broil, frothing

into the flames of your passing

but the gold-toothed smile

burns brighter still.

–

Sizzle, sizzle, boil and bubble

worlds part before

the tremble of your passing–

send tremors to the core

of all the staunchest hearts

come hell or high water

There will be Blood.

–

Wounds fester

like blisters burst

your fevered pitch defies

the madness of their dreams–

the sky and the sea weep black tears

and all are consumed–

come Death or Life.

A Catalog of Colorado

It’s been several weeks now since I returned from Colorado, and aside from a few shots used to accentuate some of my poems, I’ve not posted all that many shots from the trip. This is to set things right. Though I took hundreds of shots while out and about in the mountainous state, I have selected a few here as a sort of highlight real for the trip. WordPress, I think, would be quite upset with me if I tried to upload everything. In fact, I think I’d be liable to break the bloody system.

So here, in a nutshell, is my trip. What better inspiration could one have asked for? Sights featured in my shots include Rocky Mountain National Park, the Red Rocks and Red Rocks Amphitheater, my brother and sister-in-law’s home, and just a few shots from the more nature-inclined areas around Denver, CO.

Moya and Ares

The family.

Red Rocks Amphitheater

My brother, Jim

The folks

At the top of the world.

Moose!

My sister-in-law, Cassie.

Simplicity has its Moments

The bay along which Traverse City is nestled, in the upper reaches of Michigan, swarms with an all-together common critter of the coasts: the Seagull. As I sat along the coast, staring out over the lake, it was hard not to notice them fluttering all about, crawling on the rocks and wandering the beach, only to take wing once more to try their luck in lakeward dive-bombs.

It was they, coupled with the beauty of the scene itself, that inspired this next poem:

Beside the bay,

I heard the seagulls crying;

Oceans stretch beneath the sky

Till blue entangles blue

And miles become but one more breath—

There is air and there is water

And somewhere in between

The mountains rise and fall;

See the coast is glittering

And the sun is in the sand—

Beside the sea,

All man is set to dreaming

Of the land beyond those sapphire rings—

The gulls have all the world

But all they want is food.