The sky, the sea, the dog

The big sky laps the wooden planks,
string bean poles hold nothing but themselves,
sticking out like a ratted wall
on both sides, it and its reflection.
The sea is something spiritual to me,
said the round woman, on the dark-sand beach.
The dog we watch with a wary eye
is magical because he swims and drifts
between the wall, where he leaps from pole to pole
and our dark beach, and sniffs at our charred fire,
and when we wake the kelong is at sea,
and seems a fence, a fence that strangely moved
in the deep night, and loomed in front of me.
We were fevered with the blankets’ cold,
and the rain’s cold, and so we left
that place dripping, sandy plastic bags
on our sore bums, on rusty mountain bikes,
and never saw the floating dog again.

First Published in QLRS Vol. 11 No. 1 Jan 2012