Sea View

Photograph by Maisie Ong

He was feeling the adrenaline,

and his leg was going for ninety:

Senior citizen tourist, tweed jacket, 

warm clothes, Beanie headlining:

Guinness.

 

He sat on the promenade bench

watching the young girls go by; 

china porcelain dolls, untouchable

by fingers grown gnarled and weary

by a bygone age of manual work.

 

His hands that now hung limp and soft

were once used as tools for a living,

interpreters of all things brutal and hard,

rarely a snatched dream, or time for giving.

 

Behind him, houses in every colour

clamber up and over the static land,

excitedly competing for a view of the sea,

watching the grey exude grey, from the sky above.

 

And down they all tumble, 

on our way to the sea, 

green grass, orange lichen, dark green bladder 

of seaweed and shore;

and the tide that marries, just as easily,

takes it all away.

                                                                         ©niall oconnor 2014/24