Seashell by Bill Melton

Restless sea,
Relentless in your search
For the boundaries of your existence,
A blue-gray line marks
Where the horizon begins,
For it is you who tells the sky
How low it may dip.
Tirelessly,
Your frothy fingers reach for the shore,
Cascading in a desperate grasp
For something to cling to and,
Failing,
Slide eternally backward
Into depths unknown.
Or, playfully
Depositing a shell
On fresh washed sand.
For a moment, letting it lay
Then snatching it away
Before someone can take it.
Each wave rises
Somehow different from all others,
One tripping upon itself
Long before reaching shore;
Another pounds the sand
Falling exhausted from its swim;
Another, meeker,
Quietly slips upon the sand
Without fanfare and disappears.
But each one,
Individually mark the spot
Of their advance.
With a shell,
Different color sand
Or some other treasure
So the next to follow
Will know their limit.
Your language,
Spoken to those who love you
And are nurtured by your being;
Pulsating throbs to human ears
But secrets to your friends;
Telling tiny sandpipers
That scurry along the water edge
How far the next wave will advance
So they will never
Wet their feet,
Or the pelicans
Who skim the undulating waves
Just inches from the surface
Yet never touch it,
You speak your secret to them
As well.
A few shells
I took from you today,
Crafted by artists with
Perfect color, shape and pattern;
Taught by the mother of life.
The first one,
Deposited at my feet
As I stood spellbound at your shore,
Seeking in you
Something for myself
And, finding it somehow
In the shell you left behind.