I sit and watch the moon ripple
on Great Egg Harbor Bay, breathe in the scent
drifting from the marsh, boy memories
force a smile, fill the mind’s screen
with a clamdigging crabtrapping oystershucking town
miles away from this Jersey shore
by the world’s greatest harbor, down
at the mouth of the Chesapeake,
the old Indian town I was born in
near the wharf and the fishing boats
and the big crabhouse, and when
the wind was blowing my way, inside
the jolting range of the plant that cooked
spent crab shells into fertilizer,
the old town I grew up in, climbed
oyster shell mountains in, waded knee deep
in mud at low tide in, searching for clams
with my toes in, learned to swim and skim
shells in, grappled with boathooks
and fell off docks in, got stung by nettles
and nearly drowned in, walked the beach alone
watching gulls glide by in, capsized
a homemade kayak in, ate deviled crabs
with a glass of beer for a dime apiece in,
the old town I joined the navy in, sailed
at seventeen to see the world from, wondering
what it was out there, far
from the town and bay I loved
that seemed to me to be so strange.
It was pungently plain to me on my return:
how the rest of the world smelled funny.
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Much Love To You
Embraced
Vickie
John
I'm living in Qingdao, China, by the sea and get to eat delicious seafood whenever and wherever - so I enjoyed the salt tang of the sea and the crab phantasmagoria in your poem. Best wishes!
p.s. You reviewed my Mozart poem once, and I don't think we're oceans apart in our tastes in poetry!
And so much is happening... when I read this poem,
I can imagine youth, and action, perpetual movement.
Axilea
(((HUGS))) and love, Karla.
The gulls, always the gulls - you know, three and a half years ago, when I went to Mexico, there were none?!? They were all (at that time) at Galveston Island, Texas ... wonder if Hurricane Ike blew them all north. Been seeing a lot of gulls, lately, in North Central Texas ...
Myrna
Be always safe,
Karen
how the rest of the world smelled funny"
is the perefect ending for this beautiful warm journey you've just treated me to; fifth line outstanding and the frequent use of "in" particularly effective throughout. Sentiments recalled in tranquility and with not a trace of silliness, Gene; this is very fine indeed.
John
Love,
Eileen
The imagery is superbly carried out with the use of that rhythm and the ever present word "in"...
Cryssa
Edwin