Notes From Yesterday
I thought I might share with you the rough, and I do mean rough, poems that came from the Write Wild workshop I took part in yesterday. The workshop was great fun and quite moving at times to be discussing what wild swimming means to people, in so many different ways.
Here are the words I wrote.
Feet at the Shoreline
Split of bone, spread of skin
shaping over rounded rock
toes gripping then unpeeling.
I imagine my feet as suckers
like limpets to their stones.
Sharp edge, feet flinch,
draw back, recoil and hide as
snails into shells.
Fumble stumble
sucker stretch
until smooth sand brings relief.
Softness flatness painless.
With water now to chill the skin,
a new shock to think about.
Thoughts no longer fixed on feet, but
on the icy swell lapping higher.
They feel it all on the way in.
Each crispy crinkled ribbon of weed,
each rock, pebble, grain of sand.
The squelch of rotted briny sludge.
The warmth, the cold, the softest of dry dust,
the clay-like mud from who knows where.
Swirl of descending depth.
When they next touch ground
they feel nothing.
Numb stubs that bare my weight.
Sensitive to all and none.
Mottled blue and pink,
like a marble cake
or water upon ink.
Summer Swim
Drifting there
lazy breathless air.
Beneath the sun,
fat sun
hot and white and bright.
Soft on shoulders
soft slack skin
Air soft
sun soft.
No battle with an icy wind,
harsh biting sea
that chews on bone tight skin and sinew.
No low light, winter light,
molten lead or pewter flow.
No "to go or not to go".
Slow time,
peering time,
soaking up the heat time.
Soft sea
flat sea
not a ripple nor a wave sea.
But all dazzle and dance.
Play of light in turquoise trance.
Lazy swim
laying about swim
deep contented breath swim.
Facing down below,
the other world.
A running crab,
an "I'm bigger than you crab" pinch pinch.
Silver flash fish draws the eye to
creeping periwinkle,
the golden jewel on a green-weed crown.
A busy life
their summer life,
my summer swim.
Slippage of Time
Let tide sidle by
and drift my thoughts out with it.
My troubles, like grinding teeth
angst against themselves
and bubble deep beneath.
With slippage of time
sea smooths the sand,
the soul, the breath. And
I watch hopelessly as lacy edge
disappears to leave me sitting here,
my thoughts to trudge and dredge.