Beavertail Park The Island of Jamestown, Rhode Island

“We are like islands in the sea, separate on the surface but connected in the deep.”

― William James

 

We are rock climbing

gently, like the ancient

goats we have become.

 

We mince across

the slabs of grey slate

and white granite.

 

“Watch out for the

gravel, it’s slippery,”

a stranger tells us.

 

We pay heed

and keep on

walking gingerly.

 

The rock formations

soar jaggedly

above the Atlantic.

 

We don’t go

Down we go

across

 

the uppermost

edges stopping

to look below

 

at the clear, grey-green

foaming water swirling

over and around

 

moss covered, natural sculptures

in inlets created by

eons of erosion.

 

At one point there is

A confluence in a tidal pool;

the water is coming in

 

and going out

simultaneously.

We are entranced

 

by the ancient energy.

The power to wear away

mountains of rock invigorates us.

 

We watch

and wonder at

how deeply we feel

 

the awe of our connection

to the island, the sea,

the stone and each other.

 

 

-Judith J Katz

 

Judith J. Katz teaches Poetry at the Cooperative Arts and Humanities Magnet High School in Connecticut. She has been published in “The Muddy River Poetry Review,” “Crossing Class Anthology,” “101 Jewish Poems for the New Millenium” and “The Jewish Literary Journal.” She is a recipient of an Emily Dickensen/NEH award.