The Sea Chews Things Up

When I woke, the waves had gone black, turning over the macerated curd of the ocean bottom, heaving its sludge onto the beach. Some storm far out, I thought, had ravaged the sea, stirred up its bed, sent the whole mess flying to shore. At my feet I found a grave of starfish, broken and gnarled among the fleshy snipes and heads. Every shade of death covered the sand. It looked hopeless in the pale day but for the birds, a congress of gulls, terns, and the rarest plovers, calm for once, satiated, a measure of the one law: this sea will claim it all— feed them, catch them, grind their complicated bones.