Granite blocks emerge where the cold headland
Meets the rolling swell of the southern Tasman,
Marking out the coast in a square formation,
Ancient and heavy.

Large orthoclase crystals enclosed in stone stand
Firm against the force of the open water,
Holding up the shelf where the tides demolish
Every soft ledger.

The grey sea breaks upon the crumpled slate,
Where ancient muds were squeezed by mountain weight,
And jagged beds of turbidite
Stand vertical against the light.

No quiet rock, but layers bent and torn,
By tectonic pressure upward drawn,
The dark argillite splits away,
Above the sheltered, shallow bay.

The strata fold in razor-sharp design,
A lithic archive of a deep-sea line,
Where ancient currents laid the silt
Before the continent was built.

Here hammer-strokes ring clear against the face,
Where violent time compressed the quiet space,
And ancient ocean floors upturn,
While cold, unchanging waters burn.

Dark latite columns are stacked where the Permian furnace was opened,
Cold sub-aerial joints splitting the floor of the reef.
Wave-action enters the vault, compressing the air in the chamber,
Forcing the hydraulic slam upward through vertical stone.

High shoots the column of spray, torn loose by pneumatic explosion,
Falling in grey-white sheets back to the wash of the gut.
Iron-grey pavement remains, unbowed by the weight of the water,
Holding the volcanic rim out where the lava once ran.

The massive domes of grey Devonian stone
Rise hump-backed from the wild, unyielding foam,
Where centuries of salt and wind have sown
Their quiet weathering upon the dome.
No brittle slate, but granite blocks that roam
In vast toroidal boulders down the shore,
As if the ancient earth had built a home
Against the beating of the ocean’s roar,
And laid its heavy stones to stand for evermore.

Here sheet-joints fracture parallel and clean,
As freezing air and lichen pry the face,
Uncovering the ancient, hidden grain
Where deep-set magmas cooled in quiet space.
The granite crumbles into coarse, pink sand,
The feldspar crystals weathering away,
While massive tors still dominate the land
Above the green and salt-encrusted bay,
Where time reduces stone to grey and shifting spray.

The dark carbonaceous strata line the wall,
Where ancient forests vanished in the silt,
And interbedded clays slide to their fall.

The black seams run where Permian swamps were built,
Dividing sandstone beds that load the base,
Squeezed hard beneath the delta’s heavy tilt.

Water seeps down through every fractured face,
Weakening shale along the bedding plane,
Until the jointed blocks give up their place.

The massive block-falls crash into the main,
A sudden landslide tearing down the slope,
Leaving the naked coal-face in the rain.

The shattered benches slide beyond all scope.

The sea works steady on the level floor,
A flat expanse of stone exposed and grey,
Where countless rollers break along the shore
And grind the grit into the tidal spray.
The platform yields no purchase to the day,
But takes the blunt impact of every wave,
A polished shelf that time will slowly pave.

No soaring cliff is here, no steep abyss,
Just smooth sandstone planed down by the tide,
Where restless weed and surging waters kiss
Across the wide and solitary slide.
The hollow rock pools gather deep inside,
Reflecting back the pale and open sky,
While unrecorded centuries drift by.

The white sand drifts across the mobile spit,
And shifts the quartz grains from the outer ridge,
A vast transgressive desert by the sea.
The mobile crests advance upon the scrub,
And drown the paperbarks in wind-blown silt,
A fluid wall that shifts with every gale.
No solid stone confronts the ocean’s weight,
But loose, unbonded heaps of shifting dust
Take up the pressure of the southern swell.
The barrier migrates, erasing every path,
A rolling architecture built of air,
That moves relentless down the empty shore.

The dark argillite shoulders back the tide,
Where ancient slates are hardened to the core,
And jagged ridges sheer and stubborn ride
Against the turquoise rolling of the shore.
No sliding sand can tempt this stony pride,
Where structural fractures break the ocean’s roar,
And sheer cliff faces drop into the deep,
While white spray shatters where the ledges steep.

The strata stand upright in folded bands,
Compressed by ancient heats long turned to stone,
Defying all the shifting of the sands,
To hold a granite contour of their own.
The salt-encrusted rock forever stands,
While lower caverns echo with the moan
Of subterranean surges forced to bleed
Through every fissure where the tidal speed.

Plunge of the rock: eastward the continent terminates deep,
Shattering swells thrown from the floor of the Pacific rift,
Hardened argillite holding the ridge where the cliffs are steep,
Capped by the grey weight of the ancient volcanic drift.

Shear-planes are sliced clean through the root of the yellowing wall,
Fault-lines are locked fast where the tectonic pressures ground,
Ledges of tough tuff that will take the ocean’s fall,
Echoing back heavy and low with a rhythmic sound.

Salt-wedging tears blocks from the base of the easterly cape,
Grinding the dark stone into shards in the foaming gut,
While the relentless water is carving the headland’s shape,
Drilling its clean path through the ancient, volcanic nut.

The northern current warms the shelving sand,
Where subtropical forests meet the blue,
And golden beaches curve away the land
To where the coral islands start anew.
The ancient accretionary floors are through,
And softer barriers take the ocean’s tide,
Where mangrove creeks and shallow waters hide
From the great swells that beat the outer bar.
The transit rests upon the farthest side,
And measures out the continent afar,
Beneath the quiet rising of the evening star.