<\/p>\n
Salting the skin<\/strong><\/p>\n The sea becomes the colour of whale skin & chalk. A worm moon I am looking out, with the land behind me. I am the only light on the ocean.<\/p>\n Then a false phare beam Every tear, <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Christopher Hopkins<\/strong> grew up in Neath, South Wales during the 1970\u2019s surrounded by a landscape of machines and mountains. Christopher currently resides in the Canterbury area. His debut chapbook Take Your Journeys Home<\/em> (Clare Songbirds Publishing House) has been nominated for the IPPY book award for poetry and two Pushcart Prize nominations. His second chapbook The Last Time We Saw Strangers\u00a0<\/em>is due out in Spring 2018. His work has been published in multiple publications including The Morning Star, Backlash Press <\/em>and The Paragon Journal.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Salting the skin The sea becomes the colour of whale skin & chalk. Hanging on a day, abandoned by the chalk light. A worm moon left its portrait under the drifting ebb, sketched in ridges by the salt-water whirls and the endless boxing sands. I am looking out, with the land behind me. Where […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16195","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prose-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16195","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16195"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16195\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16466,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16195\/revisions\/16466"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16195"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16195"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16195"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nHanging on a day,
\nabandoned by the chalk light.<\/p>\n
\nleft its portrait
\nunder the drifting ebb,
\nsketched in ridges by the salt-water whirls
\nand the endless boxing sands.<\/p>\n
\nWhere the oil works shimmers in its nightly crown
\nlike every swallowed light of the ocean
\nspeared to ground.
\nThe compact black of the sea in front of me.
\nA black hole of quiet gravity.<\/p>\n
\nbreaks the hill brow to my side,
\na car\u2019s light
\nstranding me as the whale
\nsunk in the sour-dunes of dreaming.<\/p>\n
\nsalting the skin to crack,
\nunder stresses,
\nunder duress of my hidden moons,
\nmy own careless forces of gravity.
\nLike the face of the tracer moon
\nI see my light
\nto be hung
\non the broken starry.<\/p>\n