Poetry by Jennie Meyer
The beach a sheet
of untouched morning snow—
the sweeping tide a distant rumble.
My scuffing footprints
as I draft this new poem in steaming breaths—
the first and only brushstrokes.
Not a soul on the beach— no bird, no human,
no dog, not even a fowl’s fork-print embossed.
An empty canvas, free of life’s clamber.
Only one white car parked on Atlantic Ave.
One song sparrow singing like its spring
from some snow-filled limb.
One black mussel reaching out
from beneath the white sheet.
One seagull lifting off from tidal stream,
landing on the blanketed beach, mirroring
its purity with her white sloping belly,
painting it, Pollok-like, with one blast of scat.
Each of us engaged in her craft.
Jennie Meyer’s poetry has appeared in two print anthologies and numerous print and online publications. She is a 2024 finalist for Cathexis Northwest Press: Unpublished Author Chapbook contest, a 2023 winner of Beyond Words: The End of the World Creative Writing Challenge and a 2022 grant recipient from Discover Gloucester.
