Maggie and Milly and Molly and May

Somebody left a poem in our beach book in early July of 1999. As I often do, I was reading back in the volumes to see what we were doing this same week in other years. This poem struck me as a summing up of beach time for us…

maggie and milly and molly and may

went down to the beach (to play one day)

and Maggie discovered a shell that sang

so sweetly she couldn’t remember her troubles, and

milly befriended a stranded star

whose rays five languid fingers were;

and molly was chased by a horrible thing

which raced sideways while blowing bubbles: and

may came home with a smooth round stone

As small as a world and as large as alone.

For whatever we lose (like a you or a me)

it’s always ourselves we find in the sea.

—e.e. cummings

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