A poem written while working on The Copper Water — the rhythm of a fishing village that doesn't appear directly in the novel, but sits underneath every page of it.
They leave before the light has learned to break,
boats humming low against the sleeping tide,
each net folded neat, each hope not yet awake,
faith coiled tight, and stitched into their side.
The sea gives nothing back but salt and sound,
a mirror of grey that keeps its silver hidden,
they haul up water, empty, without a pound
of what they came for — uninvited, unbidden.
By dusk they return, their shoulders bent like prayer,
boats riding lighter than they left the shore,
tomorrow waits, patient, in the salted air —
they will go again. They always go once more.
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