The Farne Islands
Flying Through Radar

Shadows pick a troubled course through Longstone's rocks.
A trawler bashes south.
Echelons of scarlet flashed puffins on tramlines
fly headlong for sunset burrows.

Trapped in the rays of the trawler's radar as it sweeps the island
the birds lose all sense of direction,

become heartbeat blips across a green-lit-screen.

The rays mangle their wings
into rags that flap madly
in a stunned-tumble
to the sea's furnace.

Once past, momentum locks their flight back
onto its true course.

The sun still melts
The rocks still turn black and hell-red.

From Islands Anthology - Iron Press, 2005