‘BIRTHDEATH’
​POETRY BY ELIZABETH GIBSON

The waters breaking, the sea parting, the sun bleeding wave
and cloud tinting both red, bright red, never to change,
and birds fly, like fairies, white silhouettes across the surf
and from somewhere in the distance a voice sounds,
singing – not a single word, just singing, and out of the egg,
the shell, the cocoon you crawl, dazed, into the dry new dawn
where, unsure why everything is singing, but thinking
what a beautiful sound it is, you rest. 

The air lightening, sweetening, the stars pricking out, tiny and
fizzling, like blossom, and once again there is singing, once
again there are no words and for a while you sit and listen,
remember the last time you didn't understand while in front
of you the sea is turning from red to blue to purple and a row
of white moths dance and you rise and walk and as the sea
parts for you, you take a look around and, thinking
what a beautiful world it was, you swim.
Picture
Photo: Elizabeth Gibson
Elizabeth Gibson is 22 and studies French and Spanish at the University of Manchester. She has work published or forthcoming in The Cadaverine, London Journal of Fiction, Far Off Places, Myths of the Near Future, The Mancunion, Octavius, Sonder, Severine, Halo, Visual Verse and Ink, Sweat and Tears. Since 2012 she has been a Digital Reporter for Manchester Literature Festival and in 2016 she was chosen to be a member of The Writing Squad.

​See Elizabeth's blog and follow her on ​Twitter at @Grizonne. Her poetry and prose is generally inspired by nature and ideas about life and death, as well as her travels in France, Spain and China.