Remains of the Summer
The skull bones light as down,
fragile as the finest china tea cup,
the lower jaw sharply pointed,
fitting the upper so precisely,
bleached white, clean and dry,
and the huge eye sockets,
sitting on my desk it sends me messages
of the sand and water,
of the long curving beach
and the walks at dusk
with the seagulls crying and swooping
down to the waves and up again
into the colored sky.
Lari Smith