"But why all the fuss?" she enquired retreating
around the end of the bed in the gloom -
young girl unimpressed by my sad entreating
alone at last in her curtained room.

"It's only a body like any other."
she said while gliding away through the door;
but hers is the body I want to smother
with love and kisses for evermore.

I sail on the swell of her belly meeting
the crested curve of her breasts' dark tips;
I plunge down the dip to the bottom greeting
the smudge of hair in the trough of hips.

I rise up again to the shoulder whitening
the rolling wave of her waisted back;
ahead the face of the heavens brightening
is wreathed in swirls of fine curling wrack.

And then comes the storm with the thunder beating
my heart apart at the neck of the bay;
one last little thrust and her mouth's repeating
the words I always want her to say . . .

"I've got to be going. You'll have to leave."
A quiet voice puts an end to the gale.
Washed up on the beach what did I achieve -
passion or love or a fishing tale ?