Tom McLaughlin

Sea Anemones

I first knew them as gelatinous nodules 
stuck in crevices of dry rock
and learned from my brothers 
that if you squeezed one between your fingers 
liquid came squirting out in a little jet.
I still remember the first time 
I saw one underwater in a rockpool;
it was deep wine, splayed, 
reaching out in all directions 
like a tiny exploding star. If you touched
the tentacles with a bit of limpet meat, 
they contracted and swallowed, 
regaining their globular form. 
When I first shared a bed with a man
it came back to me — the hopeful quivering flesh,
expanding and contracting to the touch,
leaving him drowsy and closed.

Tom McLaughlin is a Northern Irish poet who has recently completed an MA in Creative Writing at Royal Holloway. His poems have previously appeared in Birds Piled Loosely, Crossways, Pulp Poets' Press, and Funicular Magazine.