Sliema Bay

An island existence
Hewn from honeyed rock
One with the mineral landscape
Where light is timeless

Weathered.

Salt-blown scrubby tamarisk
Shimmering olive immortalised as żejtun
Eternal fig rooting for hidden water
Cactus pears that repel and tempt the

Ancient.

Byzantine eyes come alive
In animating aquiline profiles
Syllables plashing like water over pebble
Harking at the sound of distant deserts

Immemorial.

Homeric depths morphing into a
Scintillating spectrum of wine-dark
Crashing upon timeworn outcrops
Relentless in reclamation

Infinite.

And the peregrinations of the countless
Repeat themselves
On this bastion of the midland sea
Under the falcon’s encompassing gaze

Perpetual.

Ling Teo
Malta, October 2016

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Lawyer, educator, author, culinary enthusiast, super-caffeinated HIIT addict with a black belt in tsundoku, Ling Teo attempts to channel the voices in her head and her observation of the everyday into coherent bits of creative writing. In her spare time, she keeps one eye on the goings-on in the technology and media law space, one on the arts and culture scene in Singapore, and her third eye (at the back of her head) on her students in the classroom. If she had time for a pet, it would be a Little Owl.