Conch Shell

Gabe found a bowl full of little shells we collected last summer, but complained that the sea wasn't loud enough. He fetched the conch shell that sat on the doorstep of Studio House for the whole of my childhood, and now lives with us. The sea roars out of this shell. The downside is that little crumbs of earth fall out of its gaping pink mouth when you hold it to your ear. I have shaken it and tried cleaning it, but still they come.
It has spent too much time away from the sea, and become earthbound.