SHORELINE MEETING
Wet cat ?
How wild ?
Slinking as if stalking.
Your eye looks back at mine,
and that is no eye of cat
in your gleaming head.
Only drowned cats are that drench-wet.
You proclaim otter
as you wriggle the rocks
to confound my stare.
You are sodden clay,
glistening from slapped water,
fur-lines chiselled in mud-furrows.
For a moment you are more solid that wild cat,
then you are not drowning in sea-rings,
a liquorice spine among floating weed.
Truth in the corner of my eye
has flickered by before,
but such a direct gaze
drives me from the shore.
This look from other
grants me thrilling fear.
--Ted Eames
from his book of poetry
Between Me and You
Published by Cairn Time Press
73 Pyms Road
Wem, Shropshire, SY4 5UU
