Skerries

Wind. On the beach our sweaters blown into,
we were tasting the swollen dizziness of clouds
inebriated by tingling wind chimes,
the boats’ masts gossiping in the gusts.
We walked for ages in a day
of soft strand and scattered sunlit surf pools,
the air flashing on, what stays with us
is that streaming openness of the sky’s throat
and the familiar seaside’s aftermath:
the tide coming in while we were leaving,
the palm of a hand spreading vast
with a luminous quietness and we
going back to the city in its wake,
everything dangling on the bus,
sky and strand with their huge
dregs of drunkenness in our mind’s eye
gaily bruised and hushed by the beach’s
stretched breath.