SOUTH OF SIZEWELL

SOUTH OF SIZEWELL

SOUTH OF SIZEWELL

This is my footpath between birches and firs
my dogshit I’m always watching my feet for
my straggle of sycamores and holm-oaks clinging
to their dull leaves this honeysuckle wound
round brambles is mine and so is the bracken
my cliff-top’s here crumbling under the weight
of my antique anti-tank concrete blocks
strewn at odd angles and this is my beach
layered with shingle which shifts with each tide
but never arrives these are my tangles
of orange nylon netting my plastic bottles
and this is my guillemot with oil on its breast
washed up here freezing or starving to death
here’s my power station’s perfect white dome
dissolving in cloud my swept horizon
checked for my ships and these are
the waves I own building and breaking
my foam at my feet for this is my sea
at springs and at neaps infallibly more
than I can imagine moving
and changing me always waiting.