The Buoy

He cropped up through the chops of the sea,
preserved in a buried trove
in an underneath goldmine grove
under a mackerel's skeleton key
and he's somehow always
been a part of her meaning of "we".

Along came a little red pin on a grid,
a marker of time on a map
that's always been rolled up,
wanting to be read and
wrapped in red ribbon,
and a tape-measure yarn of years and
the coordinates of their stopping to shift.
Driftwood was pulled ashore
by a bright orange ball,
he was tied to the bedrock,
the cockles and mussels
of a rock and roll romance.
A little upshot of an ocean-dance
who rolled in to town
And while he cleverly waited
and hid.
He was best thing in the treasure chest:
Our little bouy,
Syd.

Treasure

Born into water: that was the plan.

Magically you’d twirl out of her and spore into the world.

You’d head in, head-first and unfurl from an oyster;

not a pearl but some perfect little thing we’d cried about 

even thinking about.

But you were a stubborn sort of little thing 

and in the end like an oyster unwilling to be shucked

we had to pluck you out. 

You didn’t fancy a swim; you didn’t want out of your air pocket just yet. 

Like I was

in our scarlet-walled home, 

you were comfy and warm and membraned.

To remain was to be like a limpet, a squatter in a chill-out womb. 

For you, now was a bit too soon.

But with ebbs and pangs, held hands and grit

they managed to unclamp you from inside.

Wide-eyed, you

were hauled ashore with the tide.

The catch of the day, fished out

and blinking into glare.

Hook, line and sinker,

you were there. 

You’d already a flair for the dramatic

in birth, a head full of hair. 

The glorious girth and 

substantial weight was worth the

substantial wait. 

The little stowaway is no more: he’s above board now,

he’s a flag at full-mast and now

somehow he’s even there in the past. 

Which has been rewritten now. 

Something that’s always been here:

the sound of familiar waves in a conch shell

held to your ear.

Now echoes tell the future and the horizon roves close to the shore,
you're the smooth jewelled edges of once-sharp glass.

You’re home now and like the untamed
sea grass, you’ll spread out and grow.

Row row row your little boat all over, Syd.

Sail far, go off-grid and look up at the 

birds and the moon and the stars.

You’re the best thing they did, 

in truth and by far. 

You can swim but you can fly as well. 

The bird gave you feathery wings so you can soar

and your dad is the level ocean floor.

So dive down to the seabed, drop an 

anchor for later

and then you can fly across the equator

until you reach something interstellar.

Go on adventures, but go home and tell her. 

Tell him and tell us everything and 

we’ll laugh and we'll tell you what we did in our day. 

And your whatever is their whatever. 

Because for as far as forever can be measured,

you’ll be their little bit of dug-up gold: 

a thing more precious than any treasure

and worth more than any lottery

that has ever been won. By anyone. 

Their little pearl, their sea-bird, their Syd, their son.

The Blue or the Red

The red or the blue?

Those others or you?

You’re told what’s true.

The country or a queue?

You’re in a mosque or on a pew.

You’re letting in all if you let in a few.

You want our country back, don’t you?

No it’s not the same as turning away a Jew.

It was different back then, we had a world view.

You don’t realise what some poor people are going through.

And so we’ll debate the reason for and the number of the dead.

We’ll see women told what to wear on their head.

Spite sent across bandwidth; an internet spread.

A child in Aleppo was just killed in his bed.

Let’s Make America Great Again instead.

Bank on hope or side with dread.

Easily bought or easily led?

Shiny gold or heavy lead,

Rage by fear is overfed.

Is it blue or is it red?

The Sea

A detour, I stopped and sat on

the shingle shore. Grey, save for

some glints shining through and wide

at low tide. I watched and smelled the churn of the sea.

My fingers found a smooth cold stone, 

I lanced it into the unknown,

and I imagined it was me.

I've coasted through the air and

I’ve been to the seabed, skimmed the superficial and

dropped, left only

mini-ripples on top of the blue.

Like the pebble I threw, I've been trimmed by the

eroding; turned nearly to sand

by the thrashing of the current. 

Currently, the pebble that is me is underneath

still. But it will - eventually - be delivered 

back to the beach by the ebb and the flow.

This I know.

As I left, the sun overcame the overcast

and made glimmering shimmies like

a last foray of desperate disco balls.

Before the next cloud falls over the sun, I thought,

One last glance. I thought:

I could be really living, instead of surviving.

I could dance home instead of driving,

and rather than stumbling, I could be diving.