under the shoe

under the shoe
   to Frank Le Baige

moments
i find myself
sitting looking
down at the
floor feeling
i’m on such
a height staring
down at
something there
recall it was
you, brother,
and your madness
stamped with a
diagnosis of
‘paranoid schizophrenia’
by a man with
watery eyes i
couldn’t tell apart
from the patients

cafe mariner

cafe mariner
   with apologies to Samuel Coleridge, 2016

Andros of the Cyclades, with thanks to the wind, waves, the light and the image taker

at a distance
catching sight of him
in a plastic chair at
the cafe
his eyes were looking
further than any sea
you might have heard of
the man with salt on his breath
and seaweed in his hair
dreadlocks i thought at
first then smelt the
dry sourness of
it the smell of
the low tide
that only
an incoming tide
can lift away.

marshals

marshals
dusk, 15, 18 july 2018
bucklands beach

Acknowledgements for use of this image to xlfencing.com, where it was posted without attribution to the photographer.

these
the
minutes
blackbirds
marshal
evening
from
earth
and
air
oversee it
from branch,
guttering