Ryan Van Winkle: a poem

Published on Friday 12 August 2011 19:20

This poem by the American-born, Edinburgh-resident poet Ryan Van Winkle from Tomorrow, We Will Live Here (Salt, £9.99) intrigues us from the title in, and as readers we also experience the "talk talk talk", and the waves' conversations. Deceptively straightforward delivery masks a complexity of longing and regret.

Van Winkle recently finished his three-year tenure as reader-in-residence at the Scottish Poetry Library, and will be appearing at this year's Edinburgh International Book Festival (29 August) .

Today the breakers are clear,

sharp, sure in the sun.

And out there, in the squint of distance,

the waves have conversations.

They do not stop.

Somewhere out there in all the talk talk talk,

somewhere out there sits Paris, all the lights.

The waves hit the rocks hard for a secret.

And I believe the clouds will burn,

leave the day to blue sky,

sweating white sand, screens of heat

obscuring everything.

The seaweed yawns ashore.

Somewhere the Sacr Coeur and closer :

a kitchen, beans soaking, an apron

tied tight around a growing waist.

You can borrow or buy Tomorrow, We Will Live Here (Salt, 9.99) from the Scottish Poetry Library, 5 Crichton's Close, Canongate, Edinburgh EH8 8DT. Phone [phone], email [e-mail] or see www.spl.org.uk for details of borrowing or buying items in person and by post.