The Edge of The World

The wood stood mute, listening to the gossiping sea.
Unmoved, it stood,
                               unmoved by the sea's sucking
Intake of breath
                            or the hissing whispers.
The wood stood ready for the steady rain.
It stood, holding its bare, rheumatised, twiggy fingers up
To the clouds, resigned to the equally silent air, damp on its bark.
The green Dicranum moss bunched on bark, a mass of soft claws
Ready to defend itself against nothing.
For nothing moved through the still air or the damp ground.
Lung damp lichen hung limp from branches.
Wrinkled and grey glistened with life, waiting for a breeze to change its look,
But nothing moved through the mute wood.
The wood stood indifferent
                                                to the sea and its moods,
Raging with foam,
                                heaving angry waves,
Spitting salt
                     and ire at the wood, but
Sullen now, sulky
                              and sucking whispers.
Only the sea's creatures moved through their brief lives.
Their brief, tormented lives.
A cormorant fished by the ice smoothed rock and would soon be gone.
A great northern diver surfaced to make the only conscious sound;
a loud ululation echoing off the rock ramparts at the shore edge.
There was no answer, nothing moved in response.
Reflecting perfectly the melancholy aloneness of
The edge of the world.