An Infinite Shore

To you, standing on the shore,

Welcome to the Storm Post Office. This letter is posted from the coast of an island, while the calendar beyond the island reads 1914. On sea-glass green cotton, italic engraved letters and tiny numerals are set with great care; a classical colonnade is etched into a narrow strip, concentric waves form a geometry, dotted lines link numerical diagrams, and an ivory scalloped tab carries a blind-embossed spiral. Here the sea is something counting can never finish.

Whitman stood on a beach at night and wrote: "A vast similitude interlocks all, / All spheres, grown, ungrown, small, large, suns, moons, planets, / All distances of place however wide." — Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass (1891–92 edition)

A shoreline can never be measured to the end, and neither can numbers. There is no need to reach a conclusion; stand here a while. When you write, tell us about the waves you saw.

From the edge of the count,

Storm Post Office

Outside: 1914 · The Island