Beach Nap
Human voices muffle
in the lullaby of tide
Overhead jets
like flies to swat
sting as they pass
Skin glows pink
under filtered light
of a nylon beach umbrella
The crinkle of newpaper
book pages turning
rustle like breakers on salted air
Wave after wave
Out of the blue
My thoughts
surface and sink
My feet sculpt sand
into hills and gullies
Parasail buoys
mark a cloudless sky
Disjointed conversations
jog up and down the beach
Did I speak out loud
or wonder to myself?
A nervous hermit crab
hurries to its hole
A lazy poem falls asleep
~ Colleen Redman 6/13/08
June 13th, 2008 4:04 pm
I like this, Colleen. I too wonder about newspapers, and I think eventually they will be obsolete.
The only thing I don’t like about the beach is having to see tattoos I’d rather not look at.
June 13th, 2008 4:18 pm
I feel like I’m there with you…
June 13th, 2008 4:39 pm
Lovely peaceful prose. No need to write, read,fill up your time with ‘chores.’ Just enjoy, Colleen. We leave soon for a summer in Maine…no, not the lighthouse & ocean Maine, the far reaches that are 3 hours’ drive north of Bangor.
All kinds of crazy and wonderful things are happening in my daughter’s life, my grandaughters’ lives, I’ll even get to hold my brand-new greatgrandaughter for the first time.
June 13th, 2008 9:29 pm
I got into the mood and onto the beach with voices becoming vague:
“Human voices muffle
in the lullaby of tide”
I closed my eyes in the sun’s warmth, feeling the heat on my skin, and I barely notice as
“Disjointed conversations
jog up and down the beach”
So thanks, Colleen, for my brief visit to the beach today. Even though the sun had already disappeared when I came to read your blog, I feel the sun and hear the waves and voices. It takes a great writer to transport us all to the beach with you like that. I especially like watching when
“A nervous hermit crab hurries to its hole
while a lazy poem falls asleep”
June 13th, 2008 10:31 pm
The newspaper… Ed and I just talked about this the other day. Makes me not-as-sad that I lost my newsroom job some years back. It probably wasn’t to be there in about 15 more years anyway.
Nice beach aroma attached to this post! Excellent.
June 14th, 2008 7:31 am
you got it for me- special poem ..sk
June 14th, 2008 2:02 pm
Wonderful poem, Colleen. You captured perfectly the rhythm, the mood, and the dreamy languor of a day at the beach. I could smell the salt air.
June 14th, 2008 3:20 pm
Same sentences struck me as struck Bonnie. 🙂
Enjoy your getaway Colleen.
June 14th, 2008 7:09 pm
Great imagery. I really could picture being there in my minds eye.
Michele could too I’m sure.
June 19th, 2008 8:28 pm
So many tattoos to not look at… reminds me of Venice Beach, CA. That’s a great line. 🙂
Drive-In Movies. Now there’s a memory that yanks me back kicking and screaming.
~S 😉