The Maker The Charles Causley Literary Blog
‘Talisman’ by Jackie Taylor
Jackie Taylor lives and works in Cornwall. She is currently studying for an MLitt in Creative Writing at Glasgow University. Her work has appeared in various anthologies and journals, and her short story collection, Strange Waters, was published by Arachne Press in July 2021.
I bought the longboard from the blonde
with surfed out eyes and scrubby edges
and wrists of multi-coloured friendship
he promised it would float me over
any difficulties I might encounter
from slight swell to full-on Storm Force 10
he promised I would float straight over
trifling sea-bed inconsistencies,
unmapped deep sea trenches and the like
the sort of things that might come up to meet me,
take me unawares, stop me in my care-free
it’ll be a breeze, he said, with a jellyfish grin.
It was all too easy, too West Coast
too easy come and easier go,
and so many plaits around his wrists
hanging too long, faded, fraying
and never any mention of the grit in the oyster.
Its absence niggled. It was all about the pearl.
I tongue-twisted sea-shells from the sea shore
ignoring their tales of reef-break havens
from Orkney to Hawaii to the moon and back.
I glued on conch, clam and mussel,
the board becoming a thing of substance
with all the satisfactory weight of rock –
there are so many ways to navigate.