I'm hypnotised by a painting
showing Storr Rock on Lady's Cove.
It is a jagged boulder mocking the sea
whose waves explode as impotently
as snowballs smashing against tanks.
A boy many years dead stares, yet the tide
rolls back and forth long after he has died.
I adore the hues of Sisley's work:
purple pebbles in the evening shade
and gold where the setting sun shines.
The water is turquoise and blue
and the sky wrinkled with white clouds,
boats a blur on the horizon.
Do Sisley and other ghosts haunt this place
or have their souls vanished without a trace?