Beautiful title, beautiful poem.  Well done.  Sue

<< Silver Harvest

 Where the waves wash lie hollowed shells of crabs,
 Faded to pale orange, yellow or white,
 Their  faces brittle on bodies light,
 Limbs loose in the wind
 And claws open to grasp the air or the fine sand,
 Poised lie at the waters end
 As if to reach the coastal rise.

 Empty shells of mussels rest like the two sides of a blue heart,
 Limpets worn to halos encircle sand
 In the space where once was flesh
 That held fast to the sea bed,
 Were promised even then to distant land.
 Razor shells bury their blades in the dunes,
 Staking their claim in the hazardous light of the sun.

 The jellyfish thinning on the sand
 Shows every grain of silver in its lens.
 All join in the odour that the tide leaves,
 The ocean's offspring giving all to appear and to ascend,
 Knew not the risks that they ran
 Or knew only in their deeper selves the wrath of the waves
 That separate from water the sighted and strong.

 Sea fronds lifted from windless deeps,
 Shielded from sun and storm, now stiffen on the shingle,
 Give colour to the pebbles as I pass.
 I tread a mosaic of periwinkles with bare feet
 And hold whelks that have for ever
 The receding sound of the sea to the listening ear.
 New shells lie amid old stones varnished
 Ring upon ring to a perfect point by the lingering brine.

 The skin and eyes of beached fish stare at a blank sky
 Far from their comforting home,
 Eyes that stared once at a mirage of hills
 Seen dimly beyond confusion of foam,
 Drawn hither by the beckoning song of birds
 On ledges where pink sea thrift springs from the barren rock,
 Or further to the grottoes and bays of green
 Where oaks gather over honeysuckle and primrose in bloom.
 I ferry the shells of mussels and crabs far inland to the bluebell woods
 Whose fragrance lifts year upon year to the summits of snow. >>