22 November 2012 - Dear Dairy #22a

Epilogue

The calm after the storm.

The quieting clubhouse
disperses its conversations across the beach.

It's 23:15 and black as pitch.
The rain has stopped
and the wind has yielded to a cool, damp calm.

Across the oily Severn Sea,
the sodium rim of Wales shines clear and bright.

Dead-weight of the Rhondda
leaning on its incandescent shore.

The sky is empty,
but for harmless scudding clouds.

Gulls have abandoned the night.
Waders melted into strand.

The sea remains aloof,
singing distant harmonies with the breeze.

And I think of the versions of me
that stand looking out across the scene.

At once loving and loathing city and wilderness,
pilgrim and prisoner to each.

The door opens,
warming me with friendship
and familiarity.

And still I gaze across wet sand
to the angular graffiti of Stokes Croft.

Swap the breeze for tears and laughter.
The tenderness of your touch
upon my wandering soul.