"groyne" poems - Hello Poetry

Shards of sail staple sky to sea as fingernail-thin boats lean in to the horizon. The surge of surf converses constantly with the silent shore, urging its message upon the oblivious beach. My children scramble on the man-made groyne, a facsimile of wild rock, in which they find caves 'with a proper rock on top' (Bea) and 'a hundred miles deep' (Willem). We are here on bikes, salt wind in our hair, and my *** slowly absorbing moisture from the almost-dry sand as they unburden their youth upon the rocky playground. And then come the treasures. A flat shell the size of my palm and worn pearlescent smooth. A fossil pebble of concentric ingrained ripples. 'Something amazing Mummy,' comes the cry. 'You have to see this stone; the colour of Coca Cola,' shouts my boy. More treasures emerge and are grafted on to the sandy pile. Quartz-like lumps and a mussel entangled with tiny seaweed strands and miniature white shells, like micro leaves and hints of feta in a fancy restaurant. The boy wears welly boots, no socks, and a plastic medal around his neck. 'Batman, Batman, Batman,' comes the cry, while Bea determinedly scans heaven and Earth for jewels to stud her imagination.

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Sep 28, 2013

Sep 28, 2013 at 11:03 AM UTC

j-warren

Jewels

Shards of sail staple sky to sea as fingernail-thin boats lean in to the horizon. The surge of surf converses constantly with the silent shore, urging its message upon the oblivious beach. My children scramble on the man-made groyne, a facsimile of wild rock, in which they find caves 'with a proper rock on top' (Bea) and 'a hundred miles deep' (Willem). We are here on bikes, salt wind in our hair, and my *** slowly absorbing moisture from the almost-dry sand as they unburden their youth upon the rocky playground. And then come the treasures. A flat shell the size of my palm and worn pearlescent smooth. A fossil pebble of concentric ingrained ripples. 'Something amazing Mummy,' comes the cry. 'You have to see this stone; the colour of Coca Cola,' shouts my boy. More treasures emerge and are grafted on to the sandy pile. Quartz-like lumps and a mussel entangled with tiny seaweed strands and miniature white shells, like micro leaves and hints of feta in a fancy restaurant. The boy wears welly boots, no socks, and a plastic medal around his neck. 'Batman, Batman, Batman,' comes the cry, while Bea determinedly scans heaven and Earth for jewels to stud her imagination.

11

Dear girl on the groyne, Forgive the forgeries upon my memory. Forgive the feebleness of my firsthand. Forgive the feeding of my frenzy. Forgive the freneticism of my prose. Take truth from the diction of my lens. I trust you will grant me a fair hearing, And offer me the clemency of purpose— To once more capture or conquer The presence of Iris herself in your greens. Grant me a jury of judicious witness, The pounding of the gavel as grace For the crime of picturing the presence. I bid the remainder of my fruitless fall. Dear girl on the groyne, Has your blacksmith forgotten you? Left to entice waves at shutter speed, Forged in flame, Chiselled and tamed on Vulcan high. Through his neglect has the time arrived To render and share for all or none— As Pandora, of beauty, of curiosity, Doomed to open the box For me and my eye. Dear the man on the beach, Do you have any sense of shame? As if the still frame holds the truest face The gods of our minds do not claim to fame, But cower and quiver with a shout of shrill. I beam bounty in the rays of the sun, Watching the groyne creak and stutter As the waves breach and mutter— A voice of too great dread to utter. I sense your presence, your song, The siren’s call to prayer. The screech of the zoom and focus, Lulling and drawing a sailor of despair. But it cannot be enough To return the green to my grey. It is but a mirror of Death, For the true beauty lies beneath the skin. As the waves crash, And the wind howls, And the flash— Our moment in time, you and I— A fleeting visit in a luminal light, Between silence and soul, Of a tune forgotten in the sands of us. Yet for the sea, a distant whisper Of a moment— The opening of a story. Was it a moment of theft? A moment of true witness? Good enough to frame? Was I truly seen? Or just a clutch for transcendence? And still, The tide remakes the shore. The groyne groans. The flash fades. You carry the image. I carry the knowing. We both were framed. We both were fire.

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Apr 6, 2025

Apr 6, 2025 at 6:12 AM UTC

Jauriel

Dear Girl on the Groyne

Dear girl on the groyne, Forgive the forgeries upon my memory. Forgive the feebleness of my firsthand. Forgive the feeding of my frenzy. Forgive the freneticism of my prose. Take truth from the diction of my lens. I trust you will grant me a fair hearing, And offer me the clemency of purpose— To once more capture or conquer The presence of Iris herself in your greens. Grant me a jury of judicious witness, The pounding of the gavel as grace For the crime of picturing the presence. I bid the remainder of my fruitless fall. Dear girl on the groyne, Has your blacksmith forgotten you? Left to entice waves at shutter speed, Forged in flame, Chiselled and tamed on Vulcan high. Through his neglect has the time arrived To render and share for all or none— As Pandora, of beauty, of curiosity, Doomed to open the box For me and my eye. Dear the man on the beach, Do you have any sense of shame? As if the still frame holds the truest face The gods of our minds do not claim to fame, But cower and quiver with a shout of shrill. I beam bounty in the rays of the sun, Watching the groyne creak and stutter As the waves breach and mutter— A voice of too great dread to utter. I sense your presence, your song, The siren’s call to prayer. The screech of the zoom and focus, Lulling and drawing a sailor of despair. But it cannot be enough To return the green to my grey. It is but a mirror of Death, For the true beauty lies beneath the skin. As the waves crash, And the wind howls, And the flash— Our moment in time, you and I— A fleeting visit in a luminal light, Between silence and soul, Of a tune forgotten in the sands of us. Yet for the sea, a distant whisper Of a moment— The opening of a story. Was it a moment of theft? A moment of true witness? Good enough to frame? Was I truly seen? Or just a clutch for transcendence? And still, The tide remakes the shore. The groyne groans. The flash fades. You carry the image. I carry the knowing. We both were framed. We both were fire.

64

*Weather’s coming up soon lad, talk is, three days, no catch for a week then* Connors’ folk slough to the Arms in the shape of four or five, a tawny pint floats the hour, and by seven the place is alive. My father now by the edge of the groyne is a gaze half mast at the sea, as he sails himself to the brink of an isle and turns a yard-arm to the lee. He sets on his oars the cataclysm of waves he casts the wind at his hair, swears salt is the sword in the taste of this life and not what falls with a tear. He'll treble a note in harmonica muse and rustily **** a bone pipe, spit saliva colder than frost on the grease and never complain of the gripe. Running the wind or roaring the cape or rounding the sound of the wire his name is the take of all seafarer kin; the hearth, my heart and the fire. My father the salt, the seafaring man a wave in the seas as they glide now found to the ocean, a son to the sea the son to the father; my guide.

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Sep 28, 2014

Sep 28, 2014 at 12:17 AM UTC

martin-challis

He Counts the Fish at his Toes

*Weather’s coming up soon lad, talk is, three days, no catch for a week then* Connors’ folk slough to the Arms in the shape of four or five, a tawny pint floats the hour, and by seven the place is alive. My father now by the edge of the groyne is a gaze half mast at the sea, as he sails himself to the brink of an isle and turns a yard-arm to the lee. He sets on his oars the cataclysm of waves he casts the wind at his hair, swears salt is the sword in the taste of this life and not what falls with a tear. He'll treble a note in harmonica muse and rustily **** a bone pipe, spit saliva colder than frost on the grease and never complain of the gripe. Running the wind or roaring the cape or rounding the sound of the wire his name is the take of all seafarer kin; the hearth, my heart and the fire. My father the salt, the seafaring man a wave in the seas as they glide now found to the ocean, a son to the sea the son to the father; my guide.

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