Sandy Mermaid

I slept, napping on the pool-strewn beach

Splashing feet drew near

Yet, I lay sleeping and placid

Children arrived to envelop me

Dumping buckets of sand

Carving with hands

˖°𓇼🌊⋆🐚🫧

Built a tail around my legs

Scalloping scales traced

Poured on a bikini,

Flung down wild salty hair,

Refashioned the outside of me

Laid the inside bare

˖°𓇼🌊⋆🐚🫧

A mermaid carved from

Shimmering green sand

Eroded and thrashed

Tide slowly overtaking

As I prayed for relief

Gradually dissolved

Into the reef

All of me melted into the sea

Beneath the dressing

Left behind

Not a shred of humanity

˖°𓇼🌊⋆🐚🫧

I float, I ebb, I ripple apart

A conch filled and emptied

With the tide

Grains of my life

Floating worldwide

Abandoned to the current

No shape or guide

Churning to the surface

Bubbling up

Just foam on the top of the ocean

Till my time has expired

K. B. Silver

The picture at the top, and these here below, were taken on my honeymoon in Gold Beach, Oregon. The beach there is this beautiful gold-green due to the large deposits of what I believe are serpentinite eroded into the sand. I brought back a couple of small stones. One I worked into a piece of jewelry, the other I kept as a decorative piece.

Gold Beach is at the mouth of the Rogue River. It washes Gold and other gems and precious placer down the cascades, where Indigenous Peoples and eventually invasive settlers would take up mining. Panning for Gold and stones like jasper right out of the river. When we visited, we saw people panning for gold and could buy supplies if we so wished. We didn't on our honeymoon, but I have always been a huge fan of geology. I've visited a couple of dozen caves and other top-side mining sites so far. I hope to one day get to go back and do a bit more rock hunting.