One foot in the boat and one foot on the shore, there is no way of knowing if we have landed. We are not yet sure if we are coming or going. I hold out my hand. Your arm is waiting.
One foot in the boat and one foot on the shore, there is no way of knowing if we have landed. We are not yet sure if we are coming or going. I hold out my hand. Your arm is waiting.
I came home tonight: the tide
pulling me sideways, up-stream;
the river with its lights red and green;
the oars are a ship, and I am moving
into oceans, into the dock,
where I will find you
drifting back
from the sand.
The power went out tonight
on both sides of the street -
no street lights or anything.
I came with a torch to find you.
You needed me to pay the ferry driver.
Stumbling through the dark
the wind loud and aggressive.
The moon thin in the sky.
Tonight the tide is rushing in, heading up-stream. It pulls the boat sideways. The starboard lights flash green across the water. I pull the oars with my whole body, moving through the water, as if I were a ship guided in to dock. I don’t touch the sandbank as I cross it. The red lights flash in front of the hills. The tide is high. I won’t have to take my shoes off when I reach the beach.
When the river swells it is never just with water.
The rain runs down the road, across the concrete, in places where it shouldn’t.
The river carries a different quality, with more dirt and less salt.
The sand on the beach is pressed down by the rain,
And people’s faces are turned down, away from the storm.
I roll up my pants and
Slip my feet into gumboots,
leaving my gloves on.
It is low tide tonight, and
it’s raining. But what can you do
When the world is full of water?
I drag the boat down the beach.
Although I cannot see the river
Or the waves within it:
Blue on blue the water
Is beyond my vision.
I hear the fish jumping.
The water slides at the edges.
I can’t see the island tonight.
Surrounded by fog,
it forgets its own name,
and the lights won’t reach it.
I hear my sister’s voice
somewhere on the beach. Her
hands glowing white.
The boat glides gently
From the sand, and the oars
Splash. I row across the river
With my head torch.
fall off like water.
I will not sleep
when you are gone.
You stand dry
with sandy fingers
while I am melting
into oceans
your rubber boots
cannot pass through.
Your net catches
foreign objects
smoothed by travels
I am passing through.
(inspired by littlebirdsings)
The stars fell, the earth titled,
The ocean swallowed us as it ran.
We were bound together, calcified.
We were oysters in our shells.
Protandric, we released ourselves
into the water, covered in cuts,
from holding the shredded parts
at the edges of our shells.
Pumping colourless blood
through all parts of the body,
we drew water in our gills, until
we fell, clattering to the ground.
Low tide tonight, and its raining,
but what can you do
when the world is full of water?
I roll up my pants
but don’t take off my gloves.
The fish jump beside the boat.
I slip my feet into gumboots
and drag the boat up the beach.
When I emerge from the path
I’m still wearing my head torch.
Fixed object in space - am I ?
I wonder, a thing to be considered
as round or soft, or swollen
in the river, drifting up and down
with the tide, edging along the beach
and the mudflats.
When the sea flattens out
far off the wind
shakes across the water.
When the sea flattens out
I can see the currents moving
as the boats change direction.
When the sea flattens out
the sound is so much clearer
and the children laugh
up around their knees.
Voices ringing like a mirror
clear on this day.
Their toes dipped in the edge
with their school dresses lifted.
I can see my reflection
when the sea flattens out
and the shadows fall
behind the hills.
Yellow
bee stings
between the fingers
climbing down a ladder
to slip
and nearly fall
wobbling
on the water
as the mother
starts the boat.
The engine loud,
she tells
the child -
but can’t be heard
over the engine.
The boat
sunk full of water
as the train
pulls away.
Sinking, she looks
at all the shopping
and the boat
full of water.
She holds her children
calling out
to hold herself
from weeping.
Drag the anchor below
the belly of the waves
pulling up seaweed
caught around a hosepipe;
talking to submarine cables
twisted, long forgotten,
in barnacles and oysters.
Just be careful of that
old bicycle thrown
into the water
and sinking in the mud
before the wharf.
