Looking South

Looking South

Looking south after summer, from the thin rail

of the Brighton jetty, a small running

boy in green bathers sweeps in the frail

sun through shallow wave-wash. Tiny whiting

fry like sharp silver, darting in his wake.

Above my head winter starts in the wings

of a sudden albatross for all my sake:

surprises me with all I’ve tried to sing.

The small boy is not a younger version

of myself. He is simply me and all

I know of convergence and the tension

of what is, and what might have been, and will.

A small boy and an albatross, the sea-

the lap of every summer that was me.