There’s so little difference
between sea and cloud
that the whole scene might as
well be upside down,
with the bisectors of St John’s
Point, a finger stretching
across the horizon, and
Mullagmore, a finger, Adam’s to God,
reaching back. To the left, white
clouds are hanging,
sheets from a bed, down the sides
of Ben Bulben; to the right
the Bluestacks are slumped beneath mosquito nets of rain.
Smokey light is filling the bay
like ether, lulling the world,
so waves that have raced across
the ocean, surviving the fury
at Rosnowlagh, now collapse,
spent, onto the sand.
Murvagh beach, pooled with clouds
we’re walking through;
two silhouettes moving along the
bottom edge of a canvas now cause
a tin of paint to splatter upward: a bevy of
oystercatchers taking to flight.
