On A Friend Who Died Suddenly Upon The Seashore by J. D. C. Fellow

Quiet he lived, and quietly died;
Nor, like the unwilling tide,
Did once complain or strive
To stay one brief hour more alive.
But as a summer wave
Serenely for a while
Will lift a crest to the sun,
Then sink again, so he
Back to the bright heavens gave
An answering smile;
Then quietly, having run
His course, bowed down his head,
And sank unmurmuringly,
Sank back into the sea,
The silent, the unfathomable sea
Of all the happy dead.

by J.D.C. FELLOW (?-?)
Public Domain Poetry

summer’s last day

his ears shone redly in the setting of the sun
his puff of hair an orange, a halo of light
and the earthworms drowsed in a rusty can
at his feet, toes splayed and warmly pink

if only there’d been another minute
one more hour to append the day
a breath stolen beneath the moon

grasshoppers made their ruckus in the tall grass
stroking limbs to their wings like tiny violins
water shimmered with the scales of spotted bass
the line’s arc and plish was his blithesome song

if only there’d been another minute
one more hour to append the day
a breath stolen beneath the moon

and so everything breathed, full of bliss and love
in this treasured moment, my memory of him
we stared into the carefree summer clouds above
before they trammeled the horizon into sepulchral night

if only there’d been another minute
one more hour to append the day
a breath stolen beneath the moon

for our shine to outlast a little while

by TETIANA ALEKSINA & TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2021

crosscurrent of spring

i’m sorry i shouted at you
i had no right (you told me darkly)
i sailed my disgrace through the reef of shame
but hadn’t we kissed at the blushing jetty?
was that just another tidal skeeting?

another day with nothing inside
yet hope still dabbed behind each ear
i’ve seen mermaids depart for other shores before
speaking wakes of dismantled devotion
i hope we prove to be the exception

once more in our summer of discontent
again we list sadly into fall apart
to become a sail’s wintry afterthought
but didn’t our lungs evolve for screaming
for when choppy waters beset us?

by TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2021