I

Along the rented sands of New York bight
used bandages and needles wash ashore.
The summer islanders are in a roar,
reduced to August in a living hell
where acid burns the living lobster’s shell,
the summer houses cost a grand a week,
and from the chartered buses Japanese
tourists descend, a Nikon in each hand,
to take some last remembrance of the other life
against a glowering sunset and bloody sand.