No one trawls in this morning’s surly,

barely purling, grey foot wash;

only the toys of coddled children drag

in sand beneath a breakfast tabletop.
Between you and the gloss of plate glass

telescopic zoom there’s a slipway,

silver to horizon. Way out 
drifting, shoals of misty shipping, and your

one fantasy of Africa ahead,

a flamingo skyline and Zanzibar.
You’re almost floating, yet moping

not ten yards over a graceless

cashier’s shoulder, the undeflectible

banality of a car congested street.