scum turns viridian if the light gets through. Sometimes
I’ll see an egret or a heron, or I’ll hear the caterwaul
of tom cats that have been ditched in sacks by the old
cement bridge. Always, a few will make it, kicking out

of the stinking hessian into the oolong-coloured sludge.
You can watch an eel slip through the reeds, or a water
rat swim through the current. People only come here
to dump rubbish, or to mull over a crime. Sometimes

though, when I stare at the marsh, all I can hear are birring
blowflies, all I can see are cats; old toms sleuthing about,
watching from the cracks of their pupils. I wait for owls
to fly from the pin oaks, to call their deep-toned, brown

notes. But often, I’ll just stare into the sky and wait for
bats to emerge, one after the other, or I’ll watch the mist
clabber up into the leaves, or I’ll walk where blebs of gas
aerate the mud with the sucking sound of ghost crabs.