Category: Beach

Some of these beach haiku were written by random trips to beach.

Most of these are part of a series based on afternoons spent at the beach on Hilton Head Island with my pad out ( a real paper note pad), hoping for words with my iPhone camera handy to add illustration to my thoughts.
I wanted to see if I would be ‘inspired’ by what I saw, by what I heard, by what I smelled, by what I tasted, what I felt emotionally and what I felt tactilely.

Some turned out okay.

Some were too forced.

Some were just bad.

Some did involve some or all of those feelings.

As far as it goes, I guess I was inspired by by what I saw, by what I heard, by what I smelled, by what I tasted, what I felt emotionally and what I felt tactilely.

Please aware that most of these haiku were NOT WRITTEN on the date in the title – for an explanation of this please see The Series link in the navigation table.

1.12.2022 – ill discoverers

ill discoverers
that think there is no land, when
see nothing but sea

Francis Bacon wrote in his The Advancement of Learning (1605 – bk. 2, ch. 7, sect. 5) that “they are ill discoverers that think there is no land, when they can see nothing but sea.”

The complete line is, “As for the possibility, they are ill discoverers that think there is no land, when they can see nothing but sea.”

As for the possibility …

That they might be giants.

Mr. Bacon warns, “But if any man shall keep a continual watchful and severe eye upon action, operation, and the use of knowledge, he may advise and take notice …”

Take notice of what?

I offer, in answer, the short story, The Glass in the Field, by James Thurber from his Fables for Our Time.

A short time ago some builders, working on a studio in Connecticut, left a huge square of plate glass standing upright in a field one day. A goldfinch flying swiftly across the field struck the glass and was knocked cold. When he came to he hastened to his club, where an attendant bandaged his head and gave him a stiff drink. “What the hell happened?” asked a sea gull. “I was flying across a meadow when all of a sudden the air crystallized on me,” said the goldfinch. The sea gull and a hawk and an eagle all laughed heartily. A swallow listened gravely. “For fifteen years, fledgling and bird, I’ve flown this country,” said the eagle, “and I assure you there is no such thing as air crystallizing. Water, yes; air, no.” “You were probably struck by a hailstone,” the hawk told the goldfinch. “Or he may have had a stroke,” said the sea gull. “What do you think, swallow?” “Why, I–I think maybe the air crystallized on him,” said the swallow. The large birds laughed so loudly that the goldfinch became annoyed and bet them each a dozen worms that they couldn’t follow the course he had flown across the field without encountering the hardened atmosphere. They all took his bet; the swallow went along to watch. The sea gull, the eagle, and the hawk decided to fly together over the route the goldfinch indicated. “You come, too,” they said to the swallow. “I–I–well, no,” said the swallow. “I don’t think I will.” So the three large birds took off together and they hit the glass together and they were all knocked cold.

Moral: He who hesitates is sometimes saved.

1.9.2022 – betwixt sand and foam

betwixt sand and foam
tide erases wind blows away
sea and shore remain

Folly Beach – Hilton Head Island, Jan 9, 2022

Today’s haiku is adapted from Sand and Foam by Kahlil Gibran

I am forever walking upon these shores,
Betwixt the sand and the foam,
The high tide will erase my foot-prints,
And the wind will blow away the foam.
But the sea and the shore will remain
Forever.

I think of two things with Sea Foam.

One is the chocolate candy that you get from Sweetland’s Candy Shop in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

On the Sweetland’s Candies website, they state:

Our famous seafoam, sometimes referred to as sponge candy, carefully crafted in small batches and coated in our dark chocolate. Light, airy, and crunchy are just a few words used to describe this magical candy.

Somehow the spongy filling is a mixture of sugar, corn syrup and gelatin all whisked together when hot.

Once cooled and broken into pieces, it is coated with milk chocolate.

It isn’t in the stores down here on the coast like you would think which makes me think about an opportunity there.

On the other hand, if it was in stores, it wouldn’t be like it is from Sweetland’s.

You can take us out of West Michigan but you can’t the Sweetland’s out of us.

Same pretty much goes for fudge.

You can find it down here.

There is a fairly good candy store on River Street in Savannah.

I recommend their pralines.

Pecan Pralines.

Not sure if you can get these up north, but if you can, they are not these real Georgia Pralines.

But the fudge here, well, it isn’t Murdick’s is it?

If you grew up in West Michigan, you went to Mackinaw.

If you went to Mackinaw, you got fudge.

It is what you do.

I don’t know why, but that is what you did.

For my wife’s birthday, one of her good friend’s from Grand Rapids was kind enough to order a gift box of three 1/2 lb. slabs of fudge sent to her down here in the low country.

Why does taste bring back so much?

Murdick’s.

Like the pills in the Matrix, one taste and I am 10 years old again.

Nothing like it in the world.

A couple of slices of this fudge and my mind goes into a sugar high and contact with the known world is disconnected.

Were did all this start?

Sea foam!

I always think of the candy when I see the sea foam like I did today.

But I am also reminded of the painting known as the Primavera by Sandro Botticelli.

The Primavera depicts the birth of Venus or Goddess of Love in Roman Mythology.

In Greek mythology, Venus is known as Aphrodite.

According to Greek mythology, Uranus and Gaia had a son named Cronus.

Cronus castrated Uranus and threw his father’s testicles into the sea.

This caused the sea to foam and out of that white foam rose Aphrodite, the goddess of love and beauty.

Think of that next time you are at the beach or the Sweetland’s Candy counter.

12.10.2021 – ideal place, right place

ideal place, right place
known or unknown, actual
or visionary

This is the most beautiful place on earth.

So reads the first line of Edward Abbey’s book, Desert Solitaire: A Season in the Wilderness.

Mr. Abbey is writing about the Utah desert.

Mr. Abbey goes on, “There are many such places.“

The first paragraph of Desert Solitaire reads,

This is the most beautiful place on earth.

There are many such places.

Every man, every woman, carries in heart and mind the image of the ideal place, the right place, the one true home, known or unknown, actual or visionary.

A houseboat in Kashmir, a view down Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn, a gray gothic farmhouse two stories high at the end of a red dog road in the Allegheny Mountains, a cabin on the shore of a blue lake in spruce and fir country, a greasy alley near the Hoboken waterfront, or even, possibly, for those of a less demanding sensibility, the world to be seen from a comfortable apartment high in the tender, velvety smog of Manhattan, Chicago, Paris, Tokyo, Rio, or Rome – there’s no limit to the human capacity for the homing sentiment.

I do not want to get into nor do I intend to get into a debate about Mr. Abbey and the person that he was.

Suffice it say that ANYONE whose first line of their Wikipedia Bio states, “American author, essayist, and anarchist” will be a person about whom, other people have strong opinions.

For me today, let me focus on the line, “Every man, every woman, carries in heart and mind the image of the ideal place, the right place, the one true home, the ideal place, the right place, actual or visionary.”

If you ask me about where I live I would respond that I live in the most beautiful place on earth.

If you ask me about where I live I would respond that I live in the ideal place, the right place.

I would like to say this is where I always wanted to live but, until a year ago, I did not know this place existed apart from a name on map.

Known or unknown.

Actual or visionary.

Maybe the best part is I know this works for me and I know that every man, every woman, carries in heart and mind the image of the ideal place, the right place.

It is not the same place.

The book, Lost Horizon, by James Hilton, the story of a man looking for his ideal place, the right place, the last line is, “Do you think he will ever find it?“

The Frank Capra movie of the same title with the same story ends with, “Here is my hope, that we all find our Shangri-La.”

There are many such places.

12.3.2021 – did not buy the boat

did not buy the boat
so where is the million bucks
that I did not spend?

The sign in the grocery store says BUY 2 and SAVE.

But if I don’t buy any, do I save even more?

Of is it if I buy more I save even more?

*shirt from a thrift store – I bought the shirt – someone else paid for label

I did not buy this boat.

Why doesn’t the money I didn’t have to buy the boat show up in my bank since I didn’t spend it?

I like to look at the boats in the marinas on the island.

The idea that they are holes in the water that you throw money into appeals greatly to my sense of wellbeing.

Big toys for big boys also makes me smile.

It was when he was asked about the cost of his yacht that famous rich-guy JP Morgan famously said, “If you have to ask how much it costs, you can’t afford it.“

When he died with only $55 Million in the bank, another famous rich-guy, Andrew Carnegie, famously said, “I thought he was rich.“

That was a 1913 $55 Million.

I like to look at the boats in the marinas on the island.

Henry Ford is reported to have asked William Randolph Hearst if he had any money.

Mr. Hearst is supposed to have said, “No, Mr. Ford, I never seem to have any.”

Ford replied, “That’s too bad. You should get 2 or 3 hundred million and put it away for a rainy day.”

As F. Scott Fitzgerald said. “Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me.“

“Yep,” said buddy Ernest Hemingway, “they have more money.”

I like to look at the boats in the marinas on the island.

One day, I figure these folks will figure out a way to make me pay for the privilege of looking at their boat.

I think of the Japanese fable of the poor student who lived over a restaurant and claimed his meager rice wasn’t so bad as he could smell the food in the restaurant.

The restaurant owner heard this and had the student arrested for stealing the smell of his food.

In court, the Judge had the student drop his few coins from one hand to the other.

The cost of the smell of the food, said the judge, will be the sound of the money.

I like to look at the boats in the marinas on the island.

I like to look and think to myself, those things sink.

What might be the charge for looking?

11.23.2021 – no markers in sight

no markers in sight
sense being unmoored from time
some abstract yearning

Adapted from the article, Trekking the Great Ocean Walk: ‘Stand with no land mass between your sweaty skin and Antarctica’ and the line:

I drop back to walk alone and with no markers of era in sight, it could be a hundred years ago; a thousand. The sense of being unmoored from time satiates some abstract yearning I didn’t even know I had.