Tuesday, October 23, 2012

seaside gothic



I am somewhere between excitement and fear.  I can’t see where I’m going – anything might be waiting there.  Or worse, nothing.

I can’t see where I’m going, and where I’m going can’t see me.  The end of the pier neither here nor there – lost in thick mist.

there for the taking
so much poetry
in the mist

I should have brought my camera – not that there is much to see.  Crows in the mist and the view to the west slightly clearer than the east.  It kills sound as well as sight, this mist.  But what it leaves of both becomes more vital.  I cling to any sensations still available.  I don’t just hear the waves – I feel them through the structure I stand on.  The footsteps of other people speak to me through the vibrations of the boards.  I am conducting a séance – awaiting knocks and tremors – trying to reach the living rather than the dead.

something certain
the sound of the waves
in this mist

And every time I walk on two crows appear just ahead of me – as if they are here to guide me back inland.  As if they have been spat out of the mist after it has finished devouring the usual white birds.