Crossley-Holland's "Idling"

IDLING

The way waves fold into themselves, sigh, then
play themselves out high on the foreshore,

a man draws and redraws the crescent contours
of the salt-woman he loves to draw to love.

--Kevin Crossley-Holland


P.S.  There are riddles here that I am working to work out; the images and unfolding of the lines draw me in here.

Crossley-Holland is a renowned translator of Anglo-Saxon riddles, a popular genre in the medieval period, among others.  His own poetry, as above, often shows such trickster influence.