for Anne Brontë

Blown-headed scone at the cliffs, Scarborough yawns.          

Its sugary cough full of the sea-air, full of the lungs            

that cannot pull the wishbone                                                      

from the scamming waves prescribed.

Our lungs drag on the town’s toffeed send-off –                                   

bonbons, juleps, the junk-food of palsy.                      

Smiles come when they coax our recovery                                  

with pellets and good views to instruct a righting,             

asthenic instincts sluiced clean as athletes.                      

No, our capacity leads us to this hoarse right                     

to rug-wrapped Augusts on a chaste beach.       

Image by: Adam Wyles