Intimations on the Ephemeral

Autumn days, like forbidden drinks, are best served on the rocks,
Where our small-town minds survey the small-town docks,
And the bay is sunken in shade,
In the shadow of the rocks,
And disappointed, weekend tourists drift over the pebble beach,
Unaware of our voices out to sea, roaring raucously in mockery,
Inland a thousand desk-lamps fill a thousand hotel windows,
Lighting the coastline like an air-strip in the dark,
Urging our sun-burned souls to embark,
In flights announced by a white gull’s bellow,
We ignore, the white gulls depart,
We will be like the lighthouse,
A flicker, a flicker,
A glimmer then dark,
We will be like salt-water,
A wave, a ripple,
A ripple, restart,
We’re the rocks the wind drags and violently throws,
Into the sea’s foaming mouth we are swallowed,
And we’re the stones a slighted, lone sunbather skips,
Horizon-wards into Mediterranean lips