Push, Push Against The Wash

Push, push against the wash
splash, scrunch, squelch in the crush
puncture, scratch inflated chains
remove the wound’s stiff bandage pus

	Dilute the varnish come t’replenish,
	I; the tide she tests red eyes
	I don’t concede the sand might vanish
	- gulling salt, enjoying jeers -
	I clamplip stanch my stomach’s rise. 

I edify, deride horizons
punch up at the plenty sky.
Instinct’s stymied, mud tugs sense
I’ve had my bath electrified.

	Rockpool-knocked, the settle-bottle’s
	smashed. I’ve washed, I’ve macron-ground
	and opportune flotsam is rocked
	- I’ve ducked the ring to scorn the shore -
	released the air I’ll need, 
					I’ve drowned.

Usurp, upend – I’d circumvent I’d
kick a castle’s firmament
and stab an offered volleyball,
pull splinters from a lifeboat hole.

		‘Retire!’ I swear the skuas cry
		askew across a one-way wind,
		currents pluck my salted hide
		and box my peninsisland in

		chapped scabbed hand hefts shit-spat rock,
		and lobs it adversarywards, blocks
		out the scene horizoneyed, -

		I spit in’t the reclining tide.
					- - -
The Wash: an ever-adversary;
when attacked, acts back enfuried.

But grains remain t’reclaim the purchase
ankles damp, 
			but ‘bove the surface.

---

(c) Michael Botur. All rights reserved.

---

back