Wrecked

There is the splintering,
the crash, the shipwreck,
rocks and wreckers,
siren-lights offshore,
unstill waters running
while guillemots roam
and ghosts of albatross
joust the masthead –
lightning, thunderbolt,
rainbow, Saint Elmo’s fire,
the dimming of aurora,
the guttering of candles –
a breakers’ yard of breakers;
strands of kelp upon the strand;
beached jetsam on the beach;
plaster-cast of castaways
and footprints on the sand;
the flesh of fingerprint
pressed on foreign flesh
fading like eternity.

There are the silences
of tomorrow, mute like swans
sailing on rockpools.
Fish in shells salve starvation
and seawater turns wine
among the lunacy of wreck.
The unrescued and unransomed
malinger at the reef
where the monsters of the deep
are foxed and where
leviathan salivates.

This is the quiet sanctuary
where you and I survive.
Far off, the gunman sleeps;
the predators are sated;
and ghosts of albatross
drop limbless to the sand.