AFTER THE HURRICANE

Cape Cod, Sept. '05

The beat of waves receding at low tide
carved a bas relief of hectic curves.
The day, now warm and windless, still preserves
these graphs of drying crystals undefiled.

The wild storms down South that smashed the land
two thousand miles along the coast, and left
whole towns destroyed, a million souls bereft,
up here just wrote some fragile lines in sand.

But who can read the signs, know what they say?
Parents have taken children back to school,
no dog walkers happily break the rules,
the summer people all have gone away.

In calm of gold and blue, I hear alone
the rapid pulse of the sea, "Atone, atone."