A poet, linguist and traveller, Anne Sherry speaks fluent French and Spanish and gets by in several other languages. Her first career was in International Human Resources; her second in Change, Development and Communications Consulting. She has lived in France, the Czech Republic and Costa Rica. Anne now combines occasional consulting with a range of writing activities, notably poetry and creative non-fiction, and frequent travel. Her first collection, Safe Passage: A Memoir in Poetry and Prose was publshed in 2014.
Gull tide
The wind picks up as I walk
towards the beach
past Seal down Hillhead.
‘A bit blowy,’ I say to the woman
smoking outside the Tattoo Parlour.
‘Och, it’s a terrible wind, hen,’ she says.
Gulls everywhere;
a world of gulls.
The wind throws them around
like specks of pollen in spring
flings them high against pale, thin sky
spins them across the silver sea
then inland to collapse on pebbles
until the siren swoops them up
and they rise again, fly up a hooley;
a world of whirl and skirl.
Suddenly the sun drops
behind a storm cloud
silver turns black;
to the west
Medmerry works its magic –
as the tides do too.
anne sherry
