by Diana Morley The sea starts here, at the tip of my toes. Goes out so far, goes out so wide, it reaches my wits’ end. Yet it all spreads out from this tiny point of me. Along the windy beach the air’s as sharp as fresh-squeezed lemon; my hands make mittens of sleeve ends, loose thoughts skim across the sand, some scatter with the litter. Later, looking seaward: I’m surging with the waves, heaving up out of the water to keep an eye on things. At dusk the cold green sea darkens, slows to liquid lead, the rising tide washes away footprints, pawprints, playprints, clawprints. Night starts here in the kitchen where the crunch of thick buttered toast melts in sips of hot garlic soup. In bed darkness spreads out from the tip of my nose as I warm sun-dried sheets still filled with the scent of the salty sea, as I start to dream, bubbling up a watery world from the deep.