Skipper – Nina Parmenter

Skipper

He lives half-sunk
in estuary mud,
cresting the ooze
like a masthead,
deep-flocked, bleached and brackish,
ringed by sinking spoil.

He can look to a shore 
shadowed by gulls,
to water ghosted with flounder,
squish in the lace of nematodes,
ride the flick
of bloodworm tongues.

Body to mud to body,
this, surely, is all a man needs:
warm toes,
the thwok of the swarf,
the hope
of fossilisation.

…

Nina Parmenter’s first collection ‘Split, Twist, Apocalypse’ will be published by Indigo Dreams in 2022. Her poetry has appeared in journals including Snakeskin, Honest Ulsterman, Light, Allegro Poetry and Ink Sweat and Tears. She lives in Wiltshire. Twitter: @ninaparmenter. Website: www.ninaparmenter.com  Facebook: @parmenterpoetry