The Sea

We are on a dinghy, it is exactly the same one

as before, blue and white, as in the other poem

we are father and son, and the white cliffs form

a scar on the horizon, the herring gull on thermals

play with the laws of gravity, and below the cobles

are fishing for whiting or lobsters, we are at one

with each other and nature, for once, as the swell's

uplift takes us below the mound of grey-blue water

the same colour as your eyes, I am in a cardigan

knitted by mum, or maybe by an aunt, and wear

old school uniform trousers, and wellingtons,

we recover the view of land, as the sea pulls

us to where she wants, your fishing rod bends

with what we pray will be cod and not weeds

the swear word, the one worst than bugger,

is snag, I think I am snagged, then you take over

as the boat lurched toward the point of the rock

or weed, it started to surf the wave, the water

now coming in, you pulled, released, and in the arc

of your desperation, then it snapped, then anger

would come, for a moment, before it with a new line

subsided like the porpoise we saw, diving back

to the depths, its blackish form, escaping from us

then we started again, the lugworm, their soft

bodies, which I hated to touch, the seductive siren

to the fish and crabs, they gyrated in their agony

somewhere in the darkness, suddenly the bites

like the quick steps of a French court suite

here there was not one solid bow of the rod

but tell-tale sign of the mackerel, the trout of the sea

as it took with alarcrity the bait, raced away with it

here I was my own master, as I reeled in this victim

with deft movements, as taught by you, then sight

of its torpedo shape, the brilliant colours of existence

as it splashed and struggled, as it came closer

then with brutality but sureness, you took it from the hook

and dashed it against the hull, then it was no more

but something to be gutted and prepared for freezer

after its death, you hurried to your rod, for now it twinged

a sign that the two of us could go home with honour

of sorts, not that you minded if you did not catch anything

but I did, because if a son feels a sadness, that his father

cannot be better than him in everything, which is nothing

like the tragedies of Sophocles or Shakespeare, revenged

sons take the throne, or in Freud transfer of the love object,

no in plain terms, we were at one, as father and son

and this was for a second time, my poetic subject.