S H O R E L I N E
Robert James Berry

The long drawl of the tide scrapes on the shingle

A wave picks at the pier's rotting ribs and teeth

There is a strut of ragged wood that

Ants have hollowed like woodpeckers

Left bloodless on the sand

A broken blue buoy

Hanging in a skein of broken nets

And one weary afternoon fisherman who

Paints with his slow brush

A green and red guardian

For the hull of his boat

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"Shoreline" ©1998 by Robert James Berry

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Original Graphic © 1998 by
Jim Davis-Rosenthal