Virginia Woolf and Beach Glass

This semester in British Literature we read some of the short stories of Virginia Woolf. One story in particular dealt with a man who collected odds and ends, particularly a piece of beach glass. Beach glass is glass that had at some point fallen into the ocean and been tossed and turned and eroded and colored until it carried no semblance to its original shape size and color. My teacher talked about how certain small objects carry odd significance with people, and after showing us this picture of some beach glass she admonished us to try to write something based off of this picture of a piece of beach glass. Here is the poem that I wrote, I simply call it Beach Glass.

Beach Glass

The argument was vivid and distracting.

John threw his hands in the air and Elizabeth screamed.

The lamp-post drove itself through him, her neck was crushed.

From this, one shard was born, and for Sea was deemed.

“Child of Mine, born of My shores, now here returned.

Through greed they made you. Through anger, back to Me.”

She reached Her blue tide and carried him down.

“From who you were, I remake you” Said the Sea.

“From anger you will become crimson-orange,

And out of your curves I will form a round stone.”

So She, the patient Sea, did just what She had said,

And through the years he tossed and turned till he shone.

Now on that beach an orphaned man walked alone.

That fight took them, many years now, from his life.

Loading stones in his pockets, he had his plan.

When one beautiful thing settled all his strife.

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I gave my teacher a copy and she seemed to like it. I actually was a bit impressed myself. I wrote it during philosophy, now I may fail. Fun!