by Edward Randell

I was jet-set; she was jetsam,
Sea-shed, she said. I thought I’d get some.
Her father, fathom five, a pearly king – and mine
A king of men. My vowels cut-glass, hers estuarine.

The voiceless act was her idea. She thought,
Rather than bray with ladies of the court,
She’d bottle every glottal, stop her gob,
Avoiding censure from Papa (a snob
Who’d hear her accent’s tang of wave and wharf
And promptly call the wedding off.)

So, not another word was said.
Except within the curtains of our bed
Where, whispering sweet dark language of the sea,
She drops her guard and aitches just for me.