Bone Beach

Dredged from the depths of a shaken Sennen seashell she hears once more his voice, low, sonorous tones, sees the bones of her past laid out, splayed out, another story playing out, can feel it in her bones, his voice burrowing in, deep beneath skin, a cold blade digging in, the tide coming in, shrouds of sea mist closing in, the veil blowing thin, membranes of memory breaking...She sees anew the drowning seas, sees for the first time his strangling hands, pebbly skulls, seaweed ropes, skeletal fingers of coral forcing bone-white wrecking lights into her cove... Bone-bleached semen strands, Sennen's strand stretching soiled sand before her like life or fate, grains like pulverised bones. His dark-dune lurking, water-window watching, waiting for riptides; a ripping of fabric, ripping of hymen, sea-hymns now silent on salt-sheened lips plump-pouty with youth. It's sordid, uncouth, the salt sprinkle of sea-sweat sheening his skin, the breath and the fingers quickening, the coral's rough rigidity piercing, ejaculation of sea foam... Buried deeper than bones, the sudden rush of memory waves rattling bones of the past, shaking Sennen seashells. Gulls screaming into the guilty hush. Secrets hidden by sea-silenced sand.