I

On one of the last
days of summer
we had never seen

the bay so flat, still
nor had we ever
seen a swimmer’s

unbroken wake, two
thin ripples widening
into a perfect isosceles
triangle, his wet-suited

body leading it along
and as we watched
little eddies formed,
we could see they
were in the wake
of the wake
of the swimmer
making his way
across the bay.

II

Northeast
of the swimmer’s

wake on the inlet
shore of an island,
a man put down his
pole in the middle
of a fishing derby
to gather washed up
seed scallops in tangles
of seaweed, for hours
he gathered these heavy
tangles laden with hundreds
and hundreds of seed scallops,
and set them back in the water
believing, hoping.

III

No one could remember
it ever happening before
that a sandbar formed
at the ocean beach, not
at this beach, a huge
sandbar, the breakers
at the far side of it and like
children, we ran on the bar
through ankle-deep wavelets
nearly clapping our hands.
As though that weren’t
enough, the sea had
carved a channel
between the bar
and the shoreline
long and deep
like a lap lane
in the ocean,
and the swimmer,
who hadn’t known
to imagine it, dove
in and swam as
though swimming
for the first time,
feeling the pulse
of the sea.