Coast Run

Marsh to my left, sea to my right

negotiating balance with rabbit holes

and roots, tough sea plants

clinging, defiantly succulent.

I taste iodine, salt, the coconut

of gorse. Thorns scratch my arms

as I swerve the inlet’s curves,

dodge a dismembered deer leg

its hoof pointing at me. The air

is empty of humans, only the wind

squeaking fretfully in the branches,

the piping of waders, mud-farmers

working the flats while they can.

I calculate distance, the need

to beat the flooding of the path –

all of us watching the tide.

Suzanna Fitzpatrick