SONG OF THE OCEAN
by
Marilyn Bueckert

The moon casts her golden mantle, over the shimmering seas,
The purr of her purpled wavelets is calling out to me.
My unclad feet creep softly over velvet cladden rocks,
As I visit the surging Pacific on my nightly solo walk.

The moody sky has deepened to the Stygian tones of night,
The evening star begins to shine – a tremulous, wavering light.
The muffled lapping of the waves on the nearby- pebbled shore,
Disgorge tiny treasures from the ocean’s sandy floor.

These spiral shells sing a thousand songs as I hold them to my ear,
They murmur tales from other shores, of love, and life and tears.
Beside me, on an islet, an arbutus-crested hill,
Tastes the kiss of the evening air and trembles from the chill.

Earlier these quiet seas were painted a million different hues
When sunset’s glaze spilled jeweled tones on tiny dancing rills,
That emptied in this ocean, whilst gulls soared overhead,
Mewling, wheeling, circling, as through the skies they sped.

The ocean teased the rocky beaches of islets in the sea,
And licked the land with tongues of surf, moistened with foamy beads,
The wavelets broke with a fretful spray as far as they could reach,
And sent endless flows of sand and shells to the wave-tossed beach.

The wind kissed me then with its salt-tinged air,
And teased her soft fingers throughout my hair.
She threw rollicking diamonds into the sea,
And drew silver pathways right to my feet.

My life’s ebbed back and forth too, as though by ocean swells,
Sorrows, like grebes come bobbing up, from my heart where they now dwell.
I must go down to my beloved sea, and fold my hands to kneel,
And let the Peace wash over me, so that I can heal.