Paua-Shell
Spilt petrol
oil on a puddle
the sea’s colour-chart
porcelain, tie-dyed.
Tap the shell:
glazed calcium.

Cat’s-Eye
Boss-eye, wall-eye, squinty lid
stony door for a sea snail’s tunnel

the long beach littered with them
domes of shell, discarded virginities

where the green girl wanders, willing
to lose hers to the right man

or to the wrong man if he should raise
his frolic head above a sand dune

glossy-black-haired, and that smile on him

Sea-Lives
Under the sand at low tide
are whispers, hisses, long slithers,
bubbles, the suck of ingestion, a soft
snap, mysteries and exclusions.

Things grow on the dunes too –
pale straggle of lupin bushes,
cutty-grass, evening primroses
puckering in the low light.

But the sea knows better.
Walk at the edge of its rich waves:
on the surface nothing shows;
underneath is fat and fecund.

Shrimping-Net
Standing just under the boatshed
knee-deep in dappled water
sand-coloured legs and the sand itself
greenish in the lit ripples
watching the shrimps avoid her net
little flexible glass rockets
and the lifted mesh always empty
gauze and wire dripping sunlight

She is too tall to stand under
this house. It is a fantasy

And moving in from the bright outskirts
further under the shadowy floor
hearing a footstep creak above
her head brushing the rough timber
edging further bending her knees
creosote beams grazing her shoulder
the ground higher the roof lower
san sifting on to her hair

She kneels in dark shallow water,
palms pressed upon shells and weed.