Stocktaking
In Scots law, the foreshore is defined as the area between the high and low water marks
of ordinary spring tides… and is presumed to be owned by ancient right by the Crown.
– Fifth Report of the Scottish Affairs Committee, 2014
Head bowed, leaving audit trails
Of prints from worn but well-shined shoes,
Bowler pulled down, smart against the cut
Of wind that shreds the waves,
A lock of greying hair awry and mimicking,
Across his pate, the seaweed plastered
On the stones, he steps with frown as furrowed as
The sand that marks the monarch’s great estate.
Calculator filed inside pinstriped jacket breast,
He taps with fingernails clipped short,
And tugs a fountain pen – engraved, a gift –
From pocket-top to note,
With whelks of ink, which rogues won’t tally up.
This buoy, say, was not here last year-end, yet
That pool holds two anemones too few.
How to reconcile the wealth of clams,
Half-crushed, their shucks no longer shells and not yet sand?
Here, a length of sky-blue rope, entwined around a jerry can
Is noted, duly, in the income stream, while there,
Amongst the dabberlocks, a hunk of driftwood, swirled
By greedy seas could now be vired from fuel to art.
He sighs. There, on the very line
Where brine-stained sand meets drifting grit,
Where black and crispy channelled wrack
Grasps at the feet of dusty dunes,
Behold: a jewel, a polished paperweight,
An emerald divot wrought from bottle drained
Who knows how long ago,
Washed up here now, on his watch, half in
And half outside the bounds
Of inventories and budget codes.
He makes a note, proceeds, tucking his tie
Between shirt buttons, as the breeze shifts up
And teases paper husks of crabs from A to B.
Six thousand miles to go,
And then the isles.
Ruth Fry is a communications professional and poet who has previously had work published in Magma and Poetry Scotland. She draws inspiration from her natural surroundings in the Highlands, where she lives with her husband, daughter and dog. Twitter and Instagram @ruthiehooch