Dry Fish

It was the time we
went to the sea
and he sat close,
so close
I felt his quivering calf
quiver against
the melting bone
of my knee

I dug my fingers
into the dirty sand
black white and cream
strewn with everything
the flood
from a week ago
washed to my
favourite shore

where he, I and members
of our ‘gang’
sat talking
who did who
in the way I spoke
arithmetic
two years ago.

Dry Fish

I didn’t dip in
with the naked ‘gang’
being the only
one with breasts – big ones –
that didn’t know
how to be.

He came out first
dog-splashed the sea
on me, sat so close
I thought he should see
a girl
so to playfully
nudge shake
flutter flatter me.

This is when I dug
into the sands
deeper and deeper
to match pace
with the shivering
and caught hold
of something bony

which I quickly
shoved in a pocket
to forget
till the next time
I wore those pants
by when
I was no longer
part of the ‘gang’.

A dry bony fish
the kind in pickled jars,
the one my mother
didn’t see as fish
but substituted for them
sat in my palm
fine skeleton intact
eyes open in taunt

of a childhood
lost to older men.