into the mud to pick samphire certainly she was standing in it          almost sinking

eating salted green     wearing those white soft brogues      sinking

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at the level of the crunch the sea breeze blowing in              flint village      spire in the distance

together in the lee      their hands     foregrounding a sloping well-fertilised                       memory

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of a field          a cabbage family         to be crushed               his red gansey was worn in May

                                      tasting the sea in his mouth, he was spitting out grains of grit

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flat hot yellow                                       sister, death is not always a portrait

the only way to describe our pain is in seagulls        

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when they ask you what kind of bed was it                say       life is a very short book                                        say brass and feathers            say we had soft-boiled eggs on toast