3 poems from 'Piddock' by James Coghill

from Piddock

veliger

a

a waif /
right through

lit-
toral space: sculled
abrupt &

(go flutter, foundling

in the rinse of your robes
rucked & with
soaked speech

(dances a coranto

colloid in /
these crushed & suede
geometries ~

quashed a null &
swilling

b

swilling some

(settle ~ frolic

your homing in on /
right spack in the middle of

(so & busily

of wave &
wave’s seething

lush a /

(loom, benthic

& by byssus yrootid,
clinker down

your anchored-to,
your living

hermitage

ctenidia

a

yes you /

& to touch by all
parts possible
press this

slick gauze to a /
& suck dry
an ocean’s wayward /

(antenna torn

eased from your gills then

(this handled

& by the grace
of haemo-

lymph graft yours to
you the way i /

not in fear of such collusion
but reckless with

(a dread necessity

this loving
& conjoined fate

(cleaved-to

as if oxygen itself
had intended
you

b

awake to

(& cried

imaginary gardens
with real /

this lifelong dialectic
reads

the lamellae
puce in

gaseous

(but only just

seep the trade-off /
baton slipped

a CO2
diffuse as cru- /

the usual…

ganglia

a

before a /

(ab-

solute in
this proto-anything /

(diffuse as

posits
raw /

(criminy!

innervates the clod though

(neurally

our dainty
sire

hiccoughs still a
drab integrity /

(a drab

& to fold the inorganic
right in
to your body:

die or
resist is— /

(by reflex blurt

yourself a—

must i…

b

since

God might not have
created

even
our

(bright happenstance

shot through
with /

(longingly

to reach back before your /

decreate or
blush a livid

quickening toward /

(impulse by—

scorched
with /

though salutes this /

(salves your

wreak,
ganglia

James has had poems published in Blackbox Manifold, Datableed, and Tentacular, as well as in anthologies from Sidekick Books. His ongoing preoccupations include animal studies, ecology, and early modern literature. He currently teaches at a specialist SEMH school.