Epistle, Late Afternoon, Winter 2004

We sat, three of us, 
hunched in a shadowed, 
slopped and tethered coal-black 
hut. On a rotting, rope-strewn 
shoreline, waiting …

for the battered kettle’s whistle 
to shriek from the stove (the only light) 
spewing forth a brew of withered
leaves swimming in beakers 
to warm our cupped hands.

Old men, you and your guest; 
as talk of fishing and war falters, 
inspiration leaks out the sodden 
walls and the small, pinched face of 
the visitor announces – 
“Hitler got it right with the Jews”.

We two stare, dumb, as acrid smoke 
from the stove creeps into our eyes 
and nose, and shifting gleams light 
up the visitors eyes. The spite 
of fanaticism tarnishing the air.

Demands of explanation do not 
assuage the guest.

We two look down at our boots, 
damp and wrinkled, coded silence 
for the night is over. It is a relief 
to leave the gloomy, ugly 
shack into the clear night air.

But as I turn towards the sea 
to damp down malodorous 
thoughts, I am instead, caught 
by a scene of beauty that takes 
my breath away.

The sky strikes a tone, a chord, 
of perfect blue; a harmonic 
vibration so pure that the sea 
reverberates like a bell, its echo 
shimmering, like a forgiveness.

I want to reach out and touch 
through; grasp the transcendence. 
I see you, my friend, draw the sight 
into yourself and know you 
are in the antarctic.

Dreaming clean, bright walls 
of colour dancing over the ice.
The visitor does not notice. 
“These are moleskins – real 
moleskins”, he says smoothing 
down his trouser leg, 

and I thought of the little 
satin-black velvet creature 
of childhood frantically 
heading for safety, 
nose-down into a tunnel.