Last week the Captain and I went to a nearby beach. I took a few pictures and thought, “Why am I taking pictures of nothing?” When I looked at the photos later, I thought how lonely the sea and the sky looked and John Masefield came to mind. I have always loved his poem, “Sea Fever.”

(By the way, did you know that John Masefield was England’s poet laureate from 1930 to 1967?)

The first line was especially appropriate.

I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,

The rest of the poem didn’t fit because the sea was really quite tame, and the wind was not like a “whetted knife.”

But the loneliness of the great expanse of water was prevalent.

You may want to click on these photos to enlarge them, especially the ones with the lonely creatures in them. They are so tiny in an immense world.

In the first photo, the general setting. Notice the pink and blue striations in the water.

Now, notice in each subsequent photo, the one lonely thing in the setting.  You will need to click to enlarge or you won’t see much. Use the back arrow to return to the page afterwards.

A sea duck, minuscule, the ocean immense,

Alone though he be, he relaxes, not tense.

The marker buoy rocking so gently and slow,

It warns of the rocks where the water is low.

A lone paddleboarder, is breaking the rule,

She stands as she’s dipping the water so cool.

The seal glides alone but with grace and finesse,

He searches for love and is feeling distress.

Could that be his love on the far other side?

Stay cool and don’t splash, just swim up with a glide.

**For sure you need to click to enlarge the photo to find Mrs. Seal on the far side of the photo.

And lastly and leastly, a lone club is measly,

But even a stick can feel beastly.