Beach Reading

The quahogs shells on the shore are riddled with scrollwork.

The tracery of worms or shell-boring clams, they are marine hieroglyphics, runes whose meaning—like the soughing whispers of the waves—I can almost, but not quite, make out.

What stories would they tell? Different ones in different seasons, perhaps: of storms tossing through the undersea beds like restless sleepers churning through nightmares; of low tides into whose calm waters the clams loose bursts of sperm and eggs; of currents rich with summer blooms of phytoplankton; of the rasp of a moon snail’s tongue-like radula as its scrapes through a hapless quahog's shell and sucks out the sweet quick flesh; of longer nights slowly leaching the heat from waves and shifting the eager tug of tides.

{A note: I do write all text and take all pictures. Please do not reproduce either without my permission.}