THE SEA OF BIG SUR REVISITED
(in memory of Aeronwy Thomas)

 

Waves weaving into waves
And weaving into waves.

It is an unfolding
Of the thundering new  
                        

Into the hurrying
And the plundering old.        
                

A sudden surge of an urge
And all shining blue.        
              

A lap-lapping coll. . .apse, a lap-lapping coll. . .apse.  

 

Wild water washing
The broken fortress of rocks,   

 
Slapping its slurping
Of spittle, its fussy froth,  

   

Along the echoing song
Of the unkempt shore.                 

 
A lap-lapping coll. . .apse, a lap-lapping coll. . .apse.      
         

Stirring its fringe of milk
Over the singing stones,  
                   

Texturing the salt air
With pouring protests of sounds,   
               

Spraying its cold story
Of fish breath and deep sobs.    

It is the calling to water
Everywhere.                         

A lap-lapping coll. . .apse, a lap-lapping coll. . .apse.                    

 
It blares out the arrival 
Of all its being,        

                       

The endless volume
Of its energy and force.        
                         

The loud crashing crush-crush,
The loud crushing crash-crash,  

 
The tattered dregs of lace
Of its shattering sighs.  

                         

The crawling and hauling
Of a translucent shawl    

            

That’s stained with a brown kelp
Like thick ragged carpets.              

 

It flushes its thinned fluid
Across the drab sand      

                    

And splashes on the jagged
Frown of the mountain.  

                         

It falls apart like rain
On the thoughts of the mind,        

                

Drowning one’s history
In a faraway town.                                       

 

Yet it lulls one’s sad heart
To a country of calm.   

                         

It carries the tin smile
Of the afternoon sun.                                

 

It is always breaking,
Breaking, and remaking   

                                     

To a genesis
Of a pattern and a plan.     

 

It is living and dying,
Dying and living,

 

A ritual, a dream,
Massaging the senses.                                      

                                     

It is the poetry
Of liquid, brash and harsh,       

                                       

An engine of harmony
Created by time.                                      

 

A splashing hymn and lush prayer
Tumbling towards home,         

 

Murmuring and mumbling
Around its moans and groans.                  

A lap-lapping coll. . .apse, a lap-lapping coll. . .apse.         

                      

A rushing and rushing
Of fast frantic moments,      

                      

The sprawling music
Of the present and the past,              

                 

A symphony of instruments
Stretching their noise        
             

Like the rhythm of rumours
Of a coming storm.                 

 

It’s the wide wet war
Of a slow-growing language                                  

 

That has pillaged the whole planet
Since it was formed.  

A lap-lapping coll. . .apse, a lap-lapping coll. . .apse.                 

 

The drama and the pulsing
Of the Pacific        
                                                       

That’s rolling out the soul
Of a memory so vast,        

                               

Here in Big Sur,
At this yawning edge of the world,

 

With its last amens,
With its first hallelujahs,

 

And the godly motion
Of all of the oceans.                                 

 

Peter Thabit Jones © 2022


Published in GARDEN OF CLOUDS/NEW AND SELECTED POEMS by Peter Thabit Jones, 2020