Our priest exulted, “How wonderful His ways,”

then climbed his pulpit's Calvary. The tide,

lit by the after-dawn had brimmed the bay's
calm space, reflecting light on the roof inside.

What boy, by a choir-loft window, could resist

turning to look? A seal swam round a trawler

whose lantern-masts were moored above in mist,

and rippled sparkling water-lap down all her

salt-rust length. Past diesel pumps and dock,

the sun unpicked the nets by the fish-house door

as I watched the seal clamber on Pollock's Rock.

The mist had almost dissolved and a green pour

of ocean swelled and turned by the harbour stair

while the priest struggled, explaining God's design,

and the seal shook his watered quiff of hair,

slicked down for Sunday morning, just like mine.