Sand Crab

BY SEAN MADDEN

At home in the swash, where skimboards skim,

greedy hands dig and willets’ beaks plunge—

the receding tide betrays the decapod’s

backward burrow mark: a sign mathematical

opening to the ocean, 

indicating what’s greater.


Sean Madden holds an MFA from the University of Kentucky. Recent poems and stories have appeared in Copper Nickel, The Nonconformist, Glassworks, and Two Thirds North. He lives in the Sierra Nevada foothills with his wife and sons. Visit him at www.seanmadden.org.

Image Credit: Matthew Fertel