Destroyed Sonnets

Indiscreet creatures rustle in damp grass,
and a screech owl, rapturous, readies her throat.
Half moon, half-lit sky, half-lost, already old
when poppies open, spiky cordgrass shakes off dew.
Human voices return, nine big cars for fourteen people.
Unnoticed by the crew: a bobcat skittering off.
Tourists they are, crossing salt marshes to get to beach,
giants treading delicate flora, whooping laughter
like children on holiday. What’s a jeweled snake,
a bush rabbit breakfasting on pink stalks of verbena,
the rare red fox to party-goers? A man cracks open
the cooler for his first beer, one tosses a cellophane
wrapper behind a dune, then a stick at the gulls
grabbing his potato chips. Gulled themselves.

ξ

Gulls grab potato chips. Gulled ourselves,
believing we snatch what we want with impunity.
Molten air, early days of the coming heat.
Where to go but beaches? Everything glitters,
Sand, ground quartz and glass, the fine crush burns.
Six-foot waves, salty jeweled sovereigns,
collapse into foam. Sun torches overhead. We won’t
survive this, will we? Slow disappearance,
voices fading, eons of trash giving itself back.
We’ll take much of the wild with us, flora and fauna.
Hush will reign. Imagine the far future,
fresh gust of air, brown death slowly greening.
Small things winging dense fog at dawn.
Indiscreet creatures rustling in damp grass.

ξ

Beverly Burch has four poetry collections, most recently Leave Me a Little Want (Terrapin Books), and two nonfiction books. Her work won the John Ciardi Prize, a Lambda Literary Award, and a Gival Poetry Prize and was a finalist for Audre Lorde Award. Her fiction and poetry have appeared in New England Review, Gulf Coast, Southern Review, Denver Quarterly, and Los Angeles Review. www.beverlyburch.come