Poetry Friday

Yesterday I was writing about poppies, and while this poem isn't about my big red poppies waving in the breeze (this one is but it doesn't quite have the mood I wanted), it does combine two of my favourite things: the beach and flowers. We're all in a summer mood today, as the garden blooms and the weather warms and school wanes.

Sea Poppies
H.D.

Amber husk
fluted with gold,
fruit on the sand
marked with a rich grain,

treasure
spilled near the shrub-pines
to bleach on the boulders:

your stalk has caught root
among wet pebbles
and drift flung by the sea
and grated shells
and split conch-shells.

Beautiful, wide-spread,
fire upon leaf,
what meadow yields
so fragrant a leaf
as your bright leaf?

And, seeing as I'm on a beach jag, here is another equally evocative poem, albeit slightly more formal.

The Tide Rises, The Tide Falls
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The tide rises,
the tide falls,
The twilight darkens, the curlew calls;
Along the sea-sands damp and brown
The traveller hastens toward the town,
And the tide rises, the tide falls.

Darkness settles on roofs and walls,
But the sea, the sea in the darkness calls;
The little waves, with their soft, white hands,
Efface the footprints in the sands,
And the tide rises, the tide falls.

The morning breaks; the steeds in their stalls
Stamp and neigh, as the hostler calls;
The day returns, but nevermore
Returns the traveller to the shore,
And the tide rises, the tide falls.

Poetry Friday is hosted today over at Wild Rose Reader. Hop on over and read what everyone else is up to. And enjoy the waves lapping at your heels.