Stones, banked up
by the sea’s edge.
children stumble along them,
buckets clutched in hand,
seek the secret stones
that glitter with crystal,
red stones veined with iron,
yellow and white striped stones
shaped like a wave,
green stones, covered in algae,
magic stones,
holed right through
or chalk white stones
imprinted with the echo
of a sponge that died
when the Sun was young;
a treasury of stones,
as abundant as apples
who lie quiet in the moon’s silver
at midnight’s low tide,
were hurled like bubbles
in shaken bottle;
tumbled smooth as glass
by a winter’s storm.
These stones to be washed
in a pink plastic bucket,
placed on slate step
to gleam in the sun.
They lie silent,
mute as bone,
but speak
a fantasia
in a child’s
open palm.