There is dignity in a ledge

Falling straight to the sea

Granite holding chunks of splintered quartz

And mica blinking back the sun,

Strength in the compass points

And rocks scrubbed clean in wind

Like martyr’s bones.

Writer, poet and teacher Sherry Hanson lives in Brunswick, Maine, and loves the sea. Her major creative space is near old Fort Popham at the end of Route 209 in Phippsburg.