Grave Robber
I found a grave. I came on the evidence one day, in a forgotten file, randomly numbered by my camera. I remember walking through white snakes of sand, lifted by the wind. It blew straight off the North Sea; ice in its jaws. Always seeking I had strode out, looking for messages in bottles, finding only crackled plastic. Holding my camera with numb hands, it had been too cold to take many photos. Further up the sand, I passed through the iodine egg-stink of seaweed, then, crunched through broken shells to the path, up and away from the rage of the ocean. The wooden steps were filled with sand, an oil company’s unmaintained project. Corporate social responsibility ravaged by the elements. On the cliff above the beach, marram grass, pink campion, gorse and broom, grew, holding the sand together with their roots. The fierce wind had stolen my breath as I looked towards the new horizon. Crumpled red and orange petals had led me through the grass, past the remains o