Sand and Soft Coral

In deep troughs between
the dark hills of water passing,
then breaking.

Sand everywhere
after bodysurfing
at ‘Ehukai or Kahana,
and later along the smoothed beaches
of Waikiki, its accrued history covered still.

Later, a cool morning in February.
Winter currents have washed away
the sand, exposing
the flat, limestone shelf
into which the ancient glyphs were carved,
the histories of the rising and falling shoreline
covered soon and again
by passing sand and limu.

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Jim Kraus‘ poems have been published or are forthcoming in Apricity Magazine, Kinalamten Gi Pasifiku Anthology (Guam), Bamboo Ridge: Journal of Hawai‛i Literature and the Arts, Cape Rock Poetry, Hawaii Pacific Review, Kentucky Poetry Review, Neologism Poetry Journal, Paragon Journal, Pudding Magazine, Virginia Quarterly Review and Voices de la Luna. Ha has given conference presentations at the College of Charleston; at Ezra Pound Conferences in Rapallo, Italy, and at the Sorbonne; at the Modern Language Association in San Francisco; and at the Association for Literature and the Environment Biennial Conference at Boston University. He won a Myrtle Clark Creative Writing Award and studied with John Unterecker, Galway Kinnell, John Logan, and Phyllis Thompson. He served as Visiting Scholar at New York University; Visiting Fellow at the University of Texas at Dallas; and Visiting Fellow at Princeton University. I earned a PhD in American Studies with specialization in environmental literature from the University of Hawai‛i. Currently, I am Professor of English at Chaminade University of Honolulu, where he also edits Chaminade Literary Review. I enjoy swimming and surfing.