to Ogier
The truth you spoke at parting, on the present
Being kind, resented then, I now accept.
For that day from the car I saw
Hawthorn trees on either side stoking flames of gorse
Yellow lamps in sunlit windows next to a yellow door
Corrugated iron sheds with palm trees standing guard
Dogs drunk on wind and surf racing down the strand.
Things like these, and more, I saw and kept
To stitch onto a stretch of cloth, stained with red and oil,
Hand-sewing seaweed for you to bathe in and to see
What I saw and wish you’d seen.
For love, there is a line where vision ends
Made by the meeting between field and sea, a thin place
Next to nothing, where we too might meet and be
And be at peace.