Today at the Beach

The wind tasted of sunlight and salt, tasted
like the hopes of hungry seabirds flinging themselves ahead of the fog
retreated beyond the reach of the naked eye but waiting
for the wind to reap the whitecaps of their tears
and send the moist blanket of oblivion rolling up the sand

The tide exposed the sand dollars,
those rounds of creams and purples, stripped them
of their camouflage, revealing their secret palmate etchings
known to man and bird alike, neither of whom bothers to note
the underside carved by ten rivers flowing into a single hole

Life is fragile as the sand dollar broken
by the gull's beak
comforted by sea foam whose bubbles hold captive
a thousand rainbows waiting for the fog to free them
from the suffering of the light