Denting the edge of a sandflat, footprints pool with water cold as blood.
Light ripples the sapphire bay.
Through a muffle of haze a bouy tells its shoal like a soul lost in its shell of skin. That distant tolling frays on the dune-grass that slices sand above the highest tidal wrack. A northerly ticks grains against green blades, braids sunlight, salt, and the cry of a single gull. At the whiskery touch of wind he turns and sees his footprints lead to him.