Down down the seaside hillock holds pebbles in the sweet indentations

Made by sparrows fast on the cliffs, and scooping in the dark

With my brown hands I pick up the rocks and hold them,

Ask all over them with my eyes—so soft soft.

They hum of the sea and smell like mushrooms.

I make small grooves and slide what I scraped away from beneath my nails,

I make lovers’ etchings in the stones, I make transfer-marks,

Carve alphabets, I throw them away.

I never place them back in their nests, but see! if they skip skip

Down down the seaside hillock to the waves,

I will have the luck thunder down down on me,

Heavy rocks, they never make it. They never do.

Maybe their aerodynamics are ruined,

Lovers’ etchings.

They sink and roll down and catch tight in another cave, this one in the grass,

This one made by the small bodies of some children.

They count the clouds in the sky while looking up up up,

The birds’ forms, and small planes, and they think of things, very idle,

Very idle, like pudding on a plate, sitting in its mess,

And like puddings these children melt in the grass,

Twisting because of the rocks under their backs,
Like the clouds they try try try try try to be born.