This man, this other

Whom brilliance of sunlight almost drowns –

He is a dark blur

Out on the beach inspecting stones.

So does he come

Foolish like this each day to stare

Drawn to an edge where there is no more edge?

Something there is wears out

As if a single look of mine might drown

That figure draped in sunlight

Till given a slight lilt

It disappears and goes inside

And I had wanted it so much,

That journey here past light-infected brickwork

The train a prolonged dawdle

Towards an absence nursed by rails, and now

This congregation of small stones

To say that, being here, you are

Almost word-perfect now.

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