the frontier of land and sea

 

divine without, divine within

the coast in Maine does not subtly transition from land to sea,

as it does in the flatlands of Down East North Carolina,

here "Down East" is where hills drop quickly to water,

whether ocean, or river, or bay, or lake,

here is where rocks brazenly endure 

and waves crash with exuberance,

here remembers the great glaciers

in the roundness of mountains and the solidity of bedrock just under all,

this mid-October color flares tree and shrub,

so sometimes the road is a golden tunnel

and maples blaze so red

that they are an artist's expression of patterned fire,

even the green of the spruce is vibrant,

my wife's sister has chased where land meets mother sea,

where the ancient beauty of tempestuous ocean is nearby her,

where a home can be made 

in Santa Barbara, San Francisco, Olympia,

Bar Harbor, Castine, Ellsworth,

there where it's the frontiers that attract,

the edges between two worlds,

the ocean called to her to swim in it,

to literally immerse into its edge,

to walk its bounds with feet and soul,

to savor its bounty on the table,

on the walls, and in her heart,

how parallel the avian world is to hers,

bounties of birds thrive just where she does,

both feed on the possibilities such abundance casually creates,

the Divine allows glimpses of itself

here where frontier rubs off the callouses

that the commonplace can too easily allow

between the divine without and the divine within.

by Henry H. Walker

October 21, ‘24