Gordon Mason

Storm

I do not see her out today,
only a sandpiper,
chased by salt-brown flurries.
Burnt coral is twisted on Moroccan cane;
a shelter for a half buried shoe sole.
A fractured scarf flaps navy blue.

I do not see her out today.
Twelve sinking steps apart,
a pair of Vileda rubber gloves
glow yellow: Professional 7½-8.

I do not see her out today.
Shells lie raped by a gull chorale.
On a girdle of skimming stones,
blackened limbs cool from the fire.
Empty tins of salmon-stuffed olives
have cupped wet sand.

I do not see her out today.
Cruzcampo and San Miguel bottles
are speared in the sand.
A nylon net strangles a bird’s neck.

I do not see her out today.
Termites play on punctured bone,
the marrow dead black.
And in a rock pool, a tan shoe drowns.

Gordon Mason

Aberfeldy

A frenetic firebird

fills the skies,

with a philharmonia

of Stravinsky strings

as we plunge from

Meall an Lochain

into a footbath

of fermented froth:

a veiled vacuum: a fungus

of microscopic crystals

that festoon Aberfeldy.

Flickers of streetlights,

stooped and scrunched

lonely figures,

unaware of the light

and life above,

creep past as we form

a crawl, a worm of drivers

in this ephemeron

clinging to the ice cold Tay.