“I should have been a pair of ragged claws
Scuttling across the floors of silent seas” – TS Eliot

Walking the shoreline at low tide, crab claws abandoned near a child’s sandcastle remind me of J. Alfred Prufrock. It pains me to see broken claws discarded on a beach when these could be scuttling across the ocean floor.

Homage to J. Alfred Prufrock

As I grow older, I identify more strongly with J. Alfred Prufock. These days I would rather stroll the beach with pants rolled, and know if mermaids or sirens call from across the waves it is not for me. I am no Odysseus tied to a masthead, or adventurer, but more often than not feel that human voices and illness drowned my dreams.

When I look back, there is the shyness of youth hidden limpet like behind a hard shell. Longing always to be hip, cool, and…