Churning in a spiral shell, <br />a monotone of waves <br />rolls from a mouth of opal <br />into memory’s caves <br />as it huskily repeats <br />in a low, convulsive breath <br />a distant, constant beat <br />gritty as truth. <br /> <br />Out of the beached whorl’s <br />salmon-tinted throat <br />and glossy mother-of-pearl <br />thrums a univocal note, <br />a steady systole, <br />as if the shell had found <br />in the early, hearsay sea <br />inaugural, salted sound.<br /><br />William F Dougherty<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/conch/
