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The sea blinds me with its hard glitter, and has cranked itself down to a very unfriendly temperature.
The headline today was
“Sydney Has Another Cold Night”
I find this funny.

The Old Blokes down by the water watched me approach.
Where’ve YOU been? They asked.
I told them I had been up in the Snowy Mountains, and they all smirked.
You’ll be used to ice, then.

Just as I was about to dive in, I turned, raised my hand then patted my wrist.
Time me. I haven’t a watch. I can’t count.
Ole Mal nods in the distance, still smirking. Pats his watch.


The cold is like being squeezed. As I surface, a loud involuntary shriek whoops out of my mouth, the water burns. Time to move.
I cannot hear them laugh, though they are all watching from a distance.


After eight laps, I can’t feel it anymore. My head is buzzing lightly, and I spin through the clear green.
Thoughts come. I dream. I am a fish.
Pale green light enters my soul, finding the spaces, filling them up for this short while.

Mal raises his hand in the distance.
The wind is ice on my skin as I stand dripping on the edge.
Thirty laps, he says, but my body knows that, secretly.


Today I am making a Lino-print of a fish with wings.
I am thinking of somebody far far away.