Can you hear it there
     whispering anonymously, just
over the next hill
                            pebbles cast
     like isolated truths, the wet
sand holding them in place
                                           sea-shaped,
     their water-weathered edges
 
and the far-flung ocean like a dark room
     to be entered through the sun’s
watery glaze
                     bare-bodied, with mouths
     full of nothingness, of the salt-
scoured elementals of the tongue
 
We were only scavengers
amongst those sparkling particulars caught
     in the wintry light
                                   a gull’s
effervescent dive, the indescribable smell
     of wind-whipped skin
                                         and though we
managed to forget the slow wade back again
     through the heaving skirts
of marram grass
                           feet stumbling
     on its ground-hooks, arms wheeling
like an acrobat’s against the moon
 
when the dune-dust gathered round our torsos
     something like believing
slipped away
 
                      some unremarkable honesty
     that made us see each other as through glass,
that made us blink to see ourselves there.