Broken Shells: Hawaii

Tuesday, September 21, 2004

Hawaii

Will be leaving Friday for a short 5 days in the islands. Looking forward to sandy beaches. Can't get Paula's Sand Woman poem out of my head. Really inspired. Can't figure out where my language has gone. Maybe inspiring scerery will help.

2 comments:

petergarner said...: Hi Judy. Have a great trip (you to E.). Don't worry about the writing. Even muses need vacations ;-)))

RT; September 23, 2004 at 10:27 AM
Aisha said...: Judy -- you guys deserve a vacation where you are NOT responsible for carting seven nut-cases around :)

All the best to Ernie -- have shown his pics on Nevada to everybody -- they are fabulous.

Aisha; September 23, 2004 at 11:26 AM

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Broken Shells

I search for postcard-perfect specimens,

oceans moaning in their depths.

Surf belches forth

broken pieces, survivor bits

of crash and thrash, puzzled guesses

at what they were

or what they might become.

I choose fragments for their shapes,

colors, the way they feel in my hand.

See how this one's edge is smoothed,

worn weary before it reached me?

A gray spiral like an eye.

A curl, a horn,

a ripple like a potato chip.

I start to arrange them mentally,

see how they might fit-

an abstract sculpture,

jagged mosaic of my own mind.

At first I fail to see it there,

the perfect shell,

the collector's dream,

as if its former occupant walked

straight out of the sea, a suicide

drowning in air, and left a relic

on the beach. I pick it up, turn it over carefully.

It's so complete.

I put it back.