The Big Blue Crab

Made of sturdy tin,

Crafted rudely by weathered hands,

Conceived as a sign of Rockport’s essential fact:

Without blue crabs the cranes would not come, and

The boats would not go out, and

The tourists would not come

With their credit cards and binoculars, and

Cameras and tripods. 

The blue crab lives along the beach, and

In the marsh, and in the brown grasses

Growing in the soft soil

Bordering between land and bay.

--July 9, 2013