Morning on a Winter Beach

by G.R. Kramer

I remember one old summer chasing

the sanderlings across the shallows,

as they obsessively sewed

the water's hem to the shore

before each receding rip tide

tore out the stitching.

Now,

past the cold breakers

gannets climb invisible towers,

seem to hesitate, then

fold themselves and plunge

into the sea.

At the wrack line lie channeled whelk,

netting and a broken crab spar,

one horseshoe shell upturned

like an offering bowl holding this February sky,

the formless corpses of jellyfish,

and moon snails dreaming deep in spiral homes.

Further up the berm the dune grass

hides traces of storm waves

now forgotten, a child's yellow sandal,

a rusted tin cup, a hinge from a door

that opened onto some sad life, a detached

deck board with nails bristling.

Later, looking over the argument of water,

I ask my father, young as we both are,

if the ocean ever sleeps. He laughs

the way he rarely did, and ruffles my hair.

For a moment I am satisfied.

They say the horseshoe crab predates

the dinosaurs. So this shell fills

and tips, fills

and tips, as if ready

to breathe the whole ocean,

one exhalation at a time

---

G.R. Kramer is a late-blooming poet whose work has appeared in recent years in the New York Times, Oberon, Palette Poetry, Red Wheelbarrow, the Atlanta Review, and Winter Anthology, among many other places. He is the 2026 recipient of the Poetry Society of Virginia's Edgar Allan Poe Award. His chapbook, Locomotive of Mangled Parts, was published in 2023 by Finishing Line Press. More about his poetry is available at grkramerpoetry.substack.com