To prove that nothing <br />really disappears <br /> <br />and nothing comes of nothing, <br />days like these <br /> <br />we go down to the beach <br />and dig for hours <br /> <br />hauling up glass and creel bones <br />from the sand, <br /> <br />veins of razor shell <br />and drifted oil, <br /> <br />buttons and fishnets, <br />bottles, scraps of sail; <br /> <br />and think how our language <br />harbours the tongues of our elders, <br /> <br />Norse and Gaelic <br />buried in the map, <br /> <br />fragments of Sanskrit <br />shining through the hymnals. <br /> <br />More than we pretend <br />of what we do <br /> <br />is restoration: <br />dreaming into life <br /> <br />a world that’s neither <br />past nor primitive, <br /> <br />but fresh as the cream of the well, <br />of some upland source <br /> <br />concealed under plywood boards <br />and nettles <br /> <br /> – wine-dark, <br />aboriginal.<br /><br />John Burnside<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/ronan/
