Sea Sonnet
A field, a sea-flower, three stones, a stile.
Not one thing close to another
throughout air. The cliffs’ uplifted lawns.
You and I walk light as wicker in virtual contact.
Prepositions lie exposed. All along
the swimmer is deeper than the water.
I have looked under the wave,
I saw your body floating on the darkness.
But time and water cannot touch.
Not once. Only a blob far out,
your singularity and the sea’s
inalienable currents flow at angles . . .
and if I love you this is incidental
as on the sand one blue towel, one white towel.
~ Alice Oswald