Up Against the Sea Poem by David Wagoner

At the foot of the cliff, the sea is taking back
what it left there long ago, and the landowners
have made a barricade of three old cars
between low and high tide and loaded them
with so many river stones, they've been weighed down
below their springs, below their shock absorbers.

The waves are breaking over the side panels,
on blurred teenage graffiti, and barnacles
and tougher limpets have made themselves at home
on mats and cushions, on the salt versions
of vinyl and rust. The sea is welcoming
all of them, as ever, as passengers
at the end of a lover's leap, at the beginning
of a joy ride down an old lover's lane again.