Monday, August 14, 2017

"Teach's Hole"

Teach's Hole - from the vantage point of Springer's Point - Ocracoke Island, NC
Teach's Hole

Live oaks hunched and bent
for centuries have pointed the way,
loblolly, beach, and maple offer swaths of shade
as perspiration tickles paths down my spine
and the humid breeze lifts a curl,
for even straight hair bends in this tucked away place
where, if one believes or listens closely enough,
a pirate's wail or song may be heard
within the deep folds of a foggy morn.

Easily imagine a bottle of rum in hand;
initial heat searing a path from throat,
to chest, to stomach.  Close my eyes,
hear the digging and hiding of the treasure chest -
for we all know it's here, somewhere...

Find myself silhouetted beneath a stunted, stilted canopy, 
divest myself of its protection, enter realm of sea and sky,
sink my toes into shifting warm sand,
witness windswept trees, roots exposed,
lounging drunkenly upon dune grass and shore;
they obviously know where the kill-devil's hidden.
Wonder which are native to Teach's Hole
and which were cast ashore upon a hurricane's whim. 

Beach glass glints blue-green but I walk by
as I spy a hermit crab at ocean's edge,
play peekaboo for a while; a gambler's luck not mine
as he darts inside at each sneaky turn of my wrist.

Return him to salty spray and settle
beside beach grass and sea oats, wax myrtle and holly,
watch pelicans and seagulls swoop and glide
above (and below) ocean's rolling surface.

Marvel how little some things change; find comfort
knowing swarthy pirates, shipwrecked ponies,
and sundry floral & fauna have anchored themselves
upon this slip of shoreline with their own triumphs
and tragedies - some widely written of,
others left to the ghosts of imagination

and as the sun settles, awash with a glorious template
of which I'd accuse a painter of exaggerated artistic liberty,
I bend my ear, eavesdrop, and embrace evening's breath
as she whispers a few secrets and stories of her own.

by Margaret Bednar, August 14, 2017

* The chiefe fudling they make in the Island (i.e. Barbados) is Rumbullion alias Kill-Devill, and the is made of suggar can distilled, a hott, hellish and terrible liquor. ("A briefe Description of the Island of Barbados" 1651)

Ocracoke Island HERE

This is linked (belatedly as I was on vacation on Ocracoke) with "Imaginary Garden with Real Toads - Out of Standard - writing unseen"

Also linked with "Imaginary Garden with Real Toads - The Tuesday Platform"

"Driftwood"





11 comments:

Anonymous said...

Marvelously woven. For a moment I was on the beach at Teach's Hole with you, taking in the waves of your tale

Sherry Blue Sky said...

Beautiful, as are the photos. What a wonderful place to visit.

Thotpurge said...

Idyllic... loved within the deep folds of a foggy morn.... lovely image.

tonispencer said...

What wonderful photos and such lovely verse. It was so vivid and descriptive I felt myself there with you, smelled the salt in the air.

Gillena Cox said...

"Wonder which are native to Teach's Hole
and which were cast ashore upon a hurricane's whim. "

A nice meditation Margaret

Much love...

Sanaa Rizvi said...

'and as the sun settles, awash with a glorious template of which I'd accuse a painter of exaggerated artistic liberty, I bend my ear, eavesdrop, and embrace evening's breath as she whispers a few secrets and stories of her own'...sigh...gorgeous!!💖

Kim M. Russell said...

So well painted, Margaret! I could feel the tickling perspiration and the humid breeze - I love the line: 'for even straight hair bends in this tucked away place'. I could see the pirates and their treasure. But my favourite lines have to be:
'sink my toes into shifting warm sand,
witness windswept trees, roots exposed,
lounging drunkenly upon dune grass and shore'
and
'Beach glass glints blue-green but I walk by
as I spy a hermit crab at ocean's edge,
play peekaboo for a while...'

Kerry O'Connor said...

How cool to walk the path of pirates!

brudberg said...

I'm especially intrigued by how very much an opposite this paradise of yours also has a breath of hell: from the sweltering heat to the pirate's voice it contrast so much with the beautiful shade, with canopies above... my word is more mellow...

Magaly Guerrero said...

The last stanza is glorious. It made me smile a grin that sings of summer truths that are so pretty we think them lies.

Susie Clevenger said...

Oh, I love live oak trees. They are ancient memory books that spur us to ask what they hide in their limbs.