SHE WHO LOVES THE BEACH

No words can express,
The depth of her contentment,
As she walks along the beach.
As the waves lap against the shores,
They create the rhythm of her life.
Balmy breezes kiss,
Her sun-bronzed skin,
And she wonders..
Could there ever be a greater destiny,
Than to be born with a love,
For the treasures of the sea?
Here, she is home.

-Suzy Toronto

ღ══════•*¨*•.¸¸ღƸ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒღ¸¸.•*¨*•══════ღ
⊰ღ POEMS FOR *✿* INSPIRATION ღ⊱
ღ══════•*¨*•.¸¸ღƸ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒღ¸¸.•*¨*•══════ღ
Design borrowed from the Garden of Grace

YOU ARE YOU

You are strong. . . when you take your
grief and teach it to smile.

You are brave. . . when you overcome your
fear and help others to do the same.

You are happy. . . when you see a flower
and are thankful for the blessing.

You are loving. . . when your own pain
does not blind you to the pain of others.

You are wise. . . when you
know the limits of your wisdom.

You are true. . . when you admit
there are times you fool yourself.

You are alive. . . when tomorrow's hope means
more to you than yesterday's mistake.

You are growing. . . when you know what
you are but not what you will become.

You are free. . . when you are in control of
yourself and do not wish to control others.

You are honorable. . . when you find
your honor is to honor others.

You are generous. . . when you
can take as sweetly as you can give.

You are humble. . . when you
do not know how humble you are.

You are thoughtful. . . when you see me
just as I am and treat me just as you are.

You are merciful. . . when you forgive in
others the faults you condemn in yourself.

You are beautiful. . . when you
don't need a mirror to tell you.

You are rich. . . when you never
need more than what you have.

You are you. . . when you are
at peace with who you are not.

Source: Positive Thoughts

LIGHT FOR YOUR LIFE

Even if everyone else is not doing good,
I alone will
Even if everyone else is doing wrong,
I alone will not

It is our thoughts
that lead us into trouble
not the other people

Rely on the teacher's message,
not the personality,
Rely on meaning,
not just words,
Rely on the real meaning,
not the provisional one,
Rely on your wisdom mind,
not your ordinary judgemental mind.

We are what we think,
all that we are arises with our thoughts,
with our thoughts,
we make the world.

Just as water cools both good and bad,
and washes away all impurity and dust,
in the same way you should develop,
thought of love for friend and foe alike,
and having reached perfection in love,
you will attain enlightenment.

To be proud of what we have received
or to envy others.
for what they have will rob us of our peace of mind.

If we fail to look after others
when they need help
who will look after us?
Indifference brings indifference
lovingkindness brings lovingkindness.

If I want to succeed in guiding a human being towards a given goal,
I must find him where he is and right start there...
to help a person I must know more than he does,
but above all
I must understand what he understands.

If I tell You something, You will forget it,
If I show You something, You will remember it,
If I involve in something, You will understand it.

There are three ways to correct our faults,
we can change through BEHAVIOR,
we can change through UNDERSTANDING,
we can change from the Heart.

Our words should be carefully chosen
for people will hear them and be
influenced by them for good or for ill.

If you know anything that is hurtful and untrue,
don't say it.
If you know anything that is helpful but untrue,
don't say it.
If you know anything that is hurtful but true,
don't say it.
If you know anything that is helpful and true
find the right time.

by Sajith Ranatunga

THE HOOVES OF THE HORSES

By W.H.Ogilvie

"The hooves of the horses O' witching and sweet
Is the music earth steals from the iron-shod feet
No whisper of lover, no trilling of bird
Can stir me as hooves of the horses have stirred
They spurn disappointment and trample despair
And drown with their drum beats the challenge of care
With scarlet and silk for their banners above
They are swifter than fortune and sweeter than love
On the wings of the morning they gather and fly
In the hush of the night-time I hear them go by
The horses of memory thundering through
With flashing white fetlocks all wet with the dew
When you lay me to slumber no spot you can choose
But will ring to the rhythm of galloping shoes
And under the daisies no grave be so deep
For the hooves of the horses to sound in my sleep"

Source: Tim Cox Fine Art's
"GOOD HORSES AND WIDE OPEN SPACES."

WHEN I HAVE FEARS

by John Keats

When I have fears that I may cease to be
Before my pen has glean'd my teeming brain,
Before high-piled books, in charactery,
Hold like rich garners the full ripen'd grain;
When I behold, upon the night's starr'd face,
Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,
And think that I may never live to trace
Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance;
And when I feel, fair creature of an hour,
That I shall never look upon thee more,
Never have relish in the faery power
Of unreflecting love;--then on the shore
Of the wide world I stand alone, and think
Till love and fame to nothingness do sink.
‪
Source: Old English Literature

EARTH GIFT LOVE MAN

The earth is a canvas
Nature the artist
You damage the canvas
You enrage the artist
Our lives are a gift
The choices our own
Squander the gift
Your on your own
Show compassion and love
To your fellow man
A world without love
Makes a beast out of man.

By: Shadowlands
November 14 2014

DREAM FOR WINTER

"In the winter, we shall travel in a little pink railway carriage
With blue cushions.
We shall be comfortable. A nest of mad kisses lies in wait
In each soft corner.
You will close your eyes, so as not to see, through the glass,
The evening shadows pulling faces.
Those snarling monsters, a population
Of black devils and black wolves.
Then you'll feel your cheek scratched...
A little kiss, like a crazy spider,
Will run round your neck...
And you'll say to me : "Find it !" bending your head
- And we'll take a long time to find that creature
- Which travels a lot...

By: Arthur Rimbaud
In a railway carriage, October 7, 70
- As translated by Oliver Bernard
(French poet Arthur Rimbaud died in Marseille, France, on this day in 1891, aged 37)

Source: Everyman's Library

ODE TO AUTUMN

by John Keats

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run;
To bend with apples the mossed cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o'er-brimmed their clammy cell.
Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reaped furrow sound asleep,
Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers;
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cider-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours.
Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,---
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir, the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft,
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

Source: Everyman's Library

The Charge of the Light Brigade

Lord Alfred Tennyson, 1809 - 1892

Half a league, half a league,
Half a league onward,
All in the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
“Forward, the Light Brigade!
Charge for the guns!” he said:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.

“Forward, the Light Brigade!”
Was there a man dismay’d?
Not tho’ the soldier knew
Some one had blunder’d:
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.

Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them
Volley’d and thunder’d;
Storm’d at with shot and shell,
Boldly they rode and well,
Into the jaws of Death,
Into the mouth of Hell
Rode the six hundred.

Flash’d all their sabres bare,
Flash’d as they turn’d in air
Sabring the gunners there,
Charging an army, while
All the world wonder’d:
Plunged in the battery-smoke
Right thro’ the line they broke;
Cossack and Russian
Reel’d from the sabre-stroke
Shatter’d and sunder’d.
Then they rode back, but not
Not the six hundred.

Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon behind them
Volley’d and thunder’d;
Storm’d at with shot and shell,
While horse and hero fell,
They that had fought so well
Came thro’ the jaws of Death,
Back from the mouth of Hell,
All that was left of them,
Left of six hundred.

When can their glory fade?
O the wild charge they made!
All the world wonder’d.
Honor the charge they made!
Honor the Light Brigade,
Noble six hundred!

THE LAMB

Little lamb, who made thee?
Dost thou know who made thee,
Gave thee life, and bid thee feed
By the stream and o’er the mead;
Gave thee clothing of delight,
Softest clothing, woolly, bright;
Gave thee such a tender voice,
Making all the vales rejoice?
Little lamb, who made thee?
Dost thou know who made thee?

Little lamb, I’ll tell thee;
Little lamb, I’ll tell thee:
He is callèd by thy name,
For He calls Himself a Lamb.
He is meek, and He is mild,
He became a little child.
I a child, and thou a lamb,
We are callèd by His name.
Little lamb, God bless thee!
Little lamb, God bless thee!

− William Blake, 1789

LOVE and FRIENDSHIP

by Emily Brontë

Love is like the wild rose-briar,
Friendship like the holly-tree—
The holly is dark when the rose-briar blooms
But which will bloom most constantly?
The wild rose-briar is sweet in spring,
Its summer blossoms scent the air;
Yet wait till winter comes again
And who will call the wild-briar fair?
Then scorn the silly rose-wreath now
And deck thee with the holly’s sheen,
That when December blights thy brow
He still may leave thy garland green.
*
A celebration of friendship in all its aspects--from the delight of making a new friend to the serene joys of longtime devotion. Poems about best friends, false friends, dear friends, lost friends, even animal friends. These poems have been selected from the work of great poets in all times and places, including Emily Dickinson, W.H. Auden, Henry David Thoreau, William Shakespeare, Sappho, Robert Frost, Rudyard Kipling, Walt Whitman, and many others.

Source: Everyman's Library

ANNABEL LEE

by Edgar Allan Poe

It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of Annabel Lee;
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.
I was a child and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea,
But we loved with a love that was more than love—
I and my Annabel Lee—
With a love that the wingèd seraphs of Heaven
Coveted her and me.
And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her highborn kinsmen came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.
The angels, not half so happy in Heaven,
Went envying her and me—
Yes!—that was the reason (as all men know,
In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.
But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we—
Of many far wiser than we—
And neither the angels in Heaven above
Nor the demons down under the sea
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride,
In her sepulchre there by the sea—
In her tomb by the sounding sea.

On this day in 1849 Edgar Allan Poe's "Annabel Lee" was published, just two days after his death. (October 11)

Source: Everyman's Library

SWEENEY AMONG THE NIGHTINGALES

by T. S. Eliot (1888 - 1965)

Apeneck Sweeney spreads his knees
Letting his arms hang down to laugh,
The zebra stripes along his jaw
Swelling to maculate giraffe.
The circles of the stormy moon
Slide westward toward the River Plate,
Death and the Raven drift above
And Sweeney guards the horned gate.
Gloomy Orion and the Dog
Are veiled; and hushed the shrunken seas;
The person in the Spanish cape
Tries to sit on Sweeney’s knees
Slips and pulls the table cloth
Overturns a coffee-cup,
Reorganized upon the floor
She yawns and draws a stocking up;
The silent man in mocha brown
Sprawls at the window-sill and gapes;
The waiter brings in oranges
Bananas figs and hothouse grapes;
The silent vertebrate in brown
Contracts and concentrates, withdraws;
Rachel née Rabinovitch
Tears at the grapes with murderous paws;
She and the lady in the cape
Are suspect, thought to be in league;
Therefore the man with heavy eyes
Declines the gambit, shows fatigue,
Leaves the room and reappears
Outside the window, leaning in,
Branches of wistaria
Circumscribe a golden grin;
The host with someone indistinct
Converses at the door apart,
The nightingales are singing near
The Convent of the Sacred Heart,
And sang within the bloody wood
When Agamemnon cried aloud,
And let their liquid droppings fall
To stain the stiff dishonoured shroud.

Source: Everyman's Library

TWO RIVERS

by Ralph Waldo Emerson

Thy summer voice, Musketaquit,
Repeats the music of the rain;
But sweeter rivers pulsing flit
Through thee, as thou through the Concord Plain.
Thou in thy narrow banks art pent:
The stream I love unbounded goes
Through flood and sea and firmament;
Through light, through life, it forward flows.
I see the inundation sweet,
I hear the spending of the steam
Through years, through men, through Nature fleet,
Through love and thought, through power and dream.
Musketaquit, a goblin strong,
Of shard and flint makes jewels gay;
They lose their grief who hear his song,
And where he winds is the day of day.
So forth and brighter fares my stream,—
Who drink it shall not thirst again;
No darkness taints its equal gleam,
And ages drop in it like rain.

Source: Everyman's Library

Ralph Waldo Emerson is one of the best-loved figures in nineteenth-century American literature. Though he earned his central place in our culture as an essayist and philosopher, since his death his reputation as a poet has grown as well. Known for challenging traditional thought and for his faith in the individual, Emerson was the chief spokesman for the Transcendentalist movement. His poems speak to his most passionately held belief: that external authority should be disregarded in favor of one’s own experience. From the embattled farmers who “fired the shot heard round the world” in the stirring “Concord Hymn,” to the flower in “The Rhodora,” whose existence demonstrates “that if eyes were made for seeing, / Then Beauty is its own excuse for being,” Emerson celebrates the existence of the sublime in the human and in nature. Combining intensity of feeling with his famous idealism, Emerson’s poems reveal a moving, more intimate side of the man revered as the Sage of Concord.

AUTUMN

Soon we will plunge ourselves into cold shadows,
And all of summer's stunning afternoons will be gone.
I already hear the dead thuds of logs below
Falling on the cobblestones and the lawn.
All of winter will return to me:
derision, Hate, shuddering, horror, drudgery and vice,
And exiled, like the sun, to a polar prison,
My soul will harden into a block of red ice.
I shiver as I listen to each log crash and slam:
The echoes are as dull as executioners' drums.
My mind is like a tower that slowly succumbs
To the blows of a relentless battering ram.
It seems to me, swaying to these shocks, that someone
Is nailing down a coffin in a hurry somewhere.
For whom? -- It was summer yesterday; now it's autumn.
Echoes of departure keep resounding in the air.

~Charles Baudelaire

*
Modern poetry begins with Charles Baudelaire (1821-67), who employed his unequalled technical mastery to create the shadowy, desperately dramatic urban landscape -- populated by the addicted and the damned -- which so compellingly mirrors our modern condition. Deeply though darkly spiritual, titanic in the changes he wrought, Baudelaire looms over all the work, great and small, created in his wake.

Source: Everyman's Library

THE MORE LOVING ONE

"Looking up at the stars, I know quite well
That, for all they care, I can go to hell,
But on earth indifference is the least
We have to dread from man or beast.
How should we like it were stars to burn
With a passion for us we could not return?
If equal affection cannot be,
Let the more loving one be me.
Admirer as I think I am
Of stars that do not give a damn,
I cannot, now I see them, say
I missed one terribly all day.
Were all stars to disappear or die,
I should learn to look at an empty sky
And feel its total dark sublime,
Though this might take me a little time."

by W. H. Auden

Source: Everyman's Library

W.H. Auden died in Vienna, Austria on this day in 1973 (aged 66).

SEE ON THE INSIDE

♥*✿*•♥

Sometimes people are quick
to judge others,
when what you see
isn't really all there.

People have different moods
different personalities
different desires,
so what you're really seeing
is only a mask,
of what others want you to see.

On the inside,
we all have the same desires,
a kind smile,
a warm heart,
a tender soul,
all wanting to be reached
on the inside.

We're all not perfect,
only human,
we'll have ups and downs
like a merry-go-round,
we'll make many mistakes.

But just remember,
the next time you see a person,
do not judge whats on
the outside,
we could be having a bad day.

Try and see on the inside,
and you will see,
the kind smile,
the warm heart,
the tender soul,
reaching out....

Copyright © Sherri Emily Avery

Source: Positive Thoughts

Where Peaceful Waters Flow

The clouds break forth the streams of light
To dance upon the earth,
And cradled in the sands of time,
Comes a newborn babies'' birth.
A gentle breeze blows through the night,
It whispers through the grass,
And ripples on the water form
As rain glistens on the glass.

And you listen to the sound,
The Lords' presence all around.
He summons us to go
Where peaceful waters flow.

A rainbow arcs across the sky,
A promise is displayed.
The graceful flight of a butterfly,
It takes my breath away.
The autumn leaves in their splendor
Fall gracefully to the earth,
And stars proclaim their song at night,
What is their beauty worth?

And you listen to the sound,
The Lords' presence all around.
He summons us to go
Where peaceful waters flow.

© Keith Burroughs
Feb 2011

Source: Family Friends Poetry

I'M NO STRANGER TO THE RAIN

I'm no stranger to the rain
I'm a friend of thunder
Friend, is it any wonder lightning strikes me
I've fought with the devil
Got down on his level
But I never gave in, so he gave up on me
I'm no stranger to the rain
I can spot bad weather
And I'm good at finding shelter in a downpour
I've been sacrificed by brothers
Crucified by lovers
But through it all I've withstood the pain
I'm no stranger to the rain
But when I get that foggy feeling
The one I'm a feelin' now
If I don't keep my head, I may drown
But it's hard to keep believing
I'll even come out even
While the rain beats a hole in the ground
And tonight it's really coming down
I'm no stranger to the rain
But there'll always be tomorrow
And I'll beg, steal, or borrow a little sunshine
I'll put this cloud behind me
That's how the Man designed me
To ride the wind and dance in hurricanes
I'm no stranger to the rain
Oh, no, I'm no stranger to the rain
I'm no stranger to the rain
I'm a friend of thunder
Friend, is it any wonder lightning strikes me
But I'll put this cloud behind me
That's how the Man designed me
To ride the wind and dance in hurricanes
I'm no stranger to the rain.
~Keith Whitley

A GIFTED PAINTER

If I were a gifted painter,
I would paint a world of delight.
If I were a wordsmith of note,
I would create a universe of kindness.
If my voice could entrance generations,
My music would echo round the globe.

I am simply what I am,
A Soul blessed with sight.
I see what the World could be.
I speak of Life, Joy and Love.
I build with my heart,
To the eternal tune of the song of Light.

Paint Your own world in your colors.
Sing Your own song in the key-of-you.
Write upon the ages
The Beauty of your Heart.
Let the Light of your Soul
Create your Own Life.

~Dulce Caramia

A GENTLE BREEZE

As I sit here all alone admiring the view of an early sunrise
I tilt my head back and close my eyes.
A soft gentle breeze crosses my face
I look around and enjoy the quietness of God's peace and the soft gentle pace
The trees are in full bloom, the leaves ready to fall
God's beauty of earth, I admire it all.
As the sun comes up and begins a new day
I sit here quietly and begin to pray.
Dear God, I begin to say, please watch over my life and keep me safe
Give me hope and show me faith.
Guide my path and let me know you are near.
Allow me to be strong and filled with love, for love conquers all fear.
A gentle breeze crosses my path, and gives me a slight chill
God answers and says: I am with you still.
I've never left you alone, or threw you aside, I am in your heart, I will be your guide.
I will show you the way to master life's difficulties, and trust your heart,
For I am with you now and forever, I shall never part.
A gentle breeze I feel again, I know my prayers are answered, God has heard my plea.
He has pointed this out for me to see.
Life has many surprises each and every day. We cannot live on regrets and sorrow.
Once again I feel a gentle breeze which means God is saying:
My child there is a tomorrow:
The sun will shine once again, the birds will continue to sing.
Memories will last forever, and enjoy life a new today, and all that it may bring.

© Laurie Swartzfager
September 2011

Source: Family Friend Poems

LIGHT

♥*✿*•♥

I am blue
I am ocean
I am sky
I am brown
I am soil
I am the roots
that never die
I am yellow
I am sun
I am stars
I am red
I am blood
I am every beat
of my waking heart.
I am orange
I am fire
I am the get set
before the go.
I am green
I am the trees
I am the moss which
finds beauty
in cracks and holes.
I am white
I am cotton trees
I am the moon
The falling snow
I am grey
I am mountain
I am rock, pebbles
and stone.
I am all life
I am all colour
Earth is my mother.
Life is my father.
In embracing
every colour
of our souls
We find the love.
We find home.
This you are this
This you are that
No, we are it all
together,
Our souls deep down
Remember that.
Why war?
Because we deny our colours.
We go against nature
trying just to be one and
no way the other.
But one day
I believe the heart
Will say that
too much red
has been shed.
And we will bow
before the blue,
the brown and the green
and the healing
will begin
all the colours will
again fuse as a
glorious team.
There will be no just black
or no just white.
We will realise our rainbow
heritage.
We will remember
all colours come from
Light.

by SC Lourie, from Light

"CHILDREN" by Khalil Gibran

Source: Everyman's Library

"And a woman who held a babe against her bosom said, 'Speak to us of Children.'
And he said:
Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you, yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts.
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness;
For even as he loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that is stable."

A bilingual anthology of poems from the sixth century to the present, Arabic Poems is a one-of-a-kind showcase of a fascinating literary tradition. The Arabic poetic legacy is as vast as it is deep, spanning a period of fifteen centuries in regions from Morocco to Iraq. Themes of love, nature, religion, and politics recur in works drawn from the pre-Islamic oral tradition through poems anticipating the recent Arab Spring. Editor Marlé Hammond has selected more than fifty poems reflecting desire and longing of various kinds: for the beloved, for the divine, for the homeland, and for change and renewal. Poets include the legendary pre-Islamic warrior ‘Antara, medieval Andalusian poet Ibn Zaydun, the mystical poet Rabi‘a al-‘Adawiyya, and the influential Egyptian Romantic Ahmad Zaki Abu Shadi. Here too are literary giants of the past century: Khalil Gibran , author of the best-selling The Prophet; popular Syrian poet Nizar Qabbani; Palestinian feminist Fadwa Tuqan; Mahmoud Darwish, bard of occupation and exile; acclaimed iconoclast Adonis; and more. In their evocations of heroism, nostalgia, mysticism, grief, and passion, the poems gathered here transcend the limitations of time and place.

"PEACEFUL WATERS"

"Thus, the first instruction toward Peace:
is not to be silent, nor to act on a roll of dice.
The first instruction toward Peace is:
One cannot step into the same water twice.

Thus, Peace I leave with you;
My peace I give to you.
And may it be so, world without end.
This being a Truth no human can undo.

For Peace comes from loving what ought never be un-loved,
from an eternal bell that cannot be unrung for any price….
Peace comes from ever knowing in love and in life,
one cannot step into the same water twice."

~Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes
✻ღ♥*✿*•♥ღ✻

Source: Tim Cox Fine Arts

MAN OF THE SEA

D. H. Lawrence

Do you see the sea, breaking itself to bits against
the islands
yet remaining unbroken, the level great sea?

Have I caught from it
the tide in my arms
that runs down to the shallows of my wrists,
and breaks
abroad in my hands, like the waves among the rocks
of substance?

Do the rollers of the sea
roll down my thighs
and over the submerged islets of my knees
with power, sea-power
sea-power
to break against the ground
in the flat, recurrent breakers of my two feet?

And is my body ocean, ocean
whose power runs to the shores along my arms
and breaks in the foamy hands, whose power rolls out
to the white-trending waves of two salt feet?

I am the sea, I am the sea!

Source: Everyman's Library