Waders

Growing up by the Atlantic coast, underneath the migratory path of the Atlantic Flyway, I took for granted the presence of shore birds, waders they are aptly called. They regarded my approaches warily but seemed willing to share the littoral space with me, as long as I obeyed their rules, which seemed to boil down to doing nothing to startle them. In my childish literal certainty, I never questioned that Crane Beach was named for the birds, but historians of Ipswich, Mass. may know differently. Just up the shore is Plum Island, officially designated the Parker National Wildlife Refuge. The birds, it seems, need a place of refuge from us.

"The roaring alongside he takes for granted,
and that every so often the world is bound to shake.
He runs, he runs to the south, finical, awkward,
in a state of controlled panic, a student of Blake.
The beach hisses like fat. On his left, a sheet
of interrupting water comes and goes
and glazes over his dark and brittle feet.
He runs, he runs straight through it, watching his toes.
--Watching, rather, the spaces of sand between them
where (no detail too small) the Atlantic drains
rapidly backwards and downwards. As he runs,
he stares at the dragging grains.
The world is a mist. And then the world is
minute and vast and clear. The tide
is higher or lower. He couldn't tell you which.
His beak is focused; he is preoccupied,
looking for something, something, something.
Poor bird, he is obsessed!
The millions of grains are black, white, tan, and gray
mixed with quartz grains, rose and amethyst."- The Sandpiper by Elizabeth Bishop, copyright by Farrar, Straus & Giroux.

You may also be interested in Plum Island, posted here 12 July 2007,
By Salt Marshes: Everett Hubbard & Arthur Wesley Dow, posted here 14 May 2008, and Alongshore with Martin Johnson Heade , posted here 23 April 2008.

Images:
1. Tsuruzawa Tansaki Morhiro - Cranes And Waves, late 18th century, Museumof Fine Arts, Boston.
2. Suzuki Harunobu - Herons In The Reeds, 18th century, Musee Guimet, Paris.
3. Zhangzhou - Chinese pot with swallows, 16th century, Museum of Applied Culture, Vienna.
4. Maebyong - Vase With cranes, Koryo Dynasty, South Korea, 12th century, Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC.

5. Hayashi Kodenji - Vase, Meiji period, Herbert Johnson Museum, Ithaca, NY.