Westward Turn

A day the colour of pewter
low cloud skimming the coast
wipers dragging drizzle
back and over itself
weather the west knows by heart.

Then the light sheered sideways
cleaving the sky in a sudden blaze
a wound of yellow, white
spilling across the slate-grey sea
Stone walls flared up in it
every mossy crevice laid bare

The wind, quiet till then,
rose into itself—
a wet push at the car door,
the Atlantic lifting against me
as if to remind me where I was

And with that sudden brightness
something yielded
a quiet hinge inside
a sealed place
opening to the air

Heaney had it right:
big soft buffetings
striking sideways,
catching the heart off guard
and blowing it open

The sky drew itself in again.
Grey reclaimed the road.
But something in me stayed altered—
a softened place
widened to the world.