Being so close to
the sea scares me.

I almost don’t
trust myself to stay
on land, to not swim

out to that far edge
where the water
runs into the horizon.

When I’m not near I
feel as though the tide

waits, or worse, it carries
on its shifts without me.
I cannot stand being

away, and before today
I hadn’t tasted salt
in the air for five months.

You drove me to
the coast as it was

getting dark; we parked up
out of town, by a beach,
and we waded in,

up to our waists. Together,
we are joined, weathered
rocks, jutting out of the dark

water, counting the waves
up to nine until midnight.

You swim around me, pulled
by the gravity of the moon, and I
see the constellation shaped

like a saucepan, its one bright corner
signalling me to awake. You
float back to me, and we

embrace. You are my anchor.