1.
From
Autoroute we exit
through
silty plains, slowing
to
the pace of sunflowers.
Where
Man and marsh commune,
once
limestone islands
emboss
this monk-drained basin.
Here,
our journey ends
in
pantiled roofs, peeling shutters
and
unmade, sun-baked pavement.
2.
Monsieur
freewheels the potholed slope -
a
single geared, sit-up and beg descent.
The
faded polo stripes
and
shorts and socks and sandals
worn
comme Hulot.
His
creased features speak of weather:
“Orages dans le Sud”,
he says
showing
front-page shots with solemn glee.
Yet
fretful, for saplings - parched
and
wilting - croak, while Bordeaux floods.
This
pitched site, plus simple, more to him
than
unretired income:
his
stubborn foothold on a walk of life.
Taking
a dim view of motorhomes -
“sangsues,
pas vrai camping”
-
he
vows to charge them extra next year.
* * *
For
Saturday evening frites,
Monsieur’s
spent all day mending.
Disgruntled,
he shakes his grizzled mop -
“Il est panne: rien ne
marche” -
an
ancient fryer in bits around his feet.
Later,
after meticulous checks
of
the pool’s pH and chlorine,
Monsieur
lingers to observe petanques,
and
exchange pleasantries:
We
talk of Pineau, Troussepinette,
some
vagaries of the Michelin inspectorate,
and
how his tomates biologique are ripening.
The
clack of boules on dusty gravel
continues
under globed lamps.
Unnoticed,
Monsieur departs for home
from
where, at eleven sharp, our lights go out:
“
Monsieur bon nuit.”
3.
Morning: warm baguettes, jam,
and the smell of bikes lent into rosemary.
The day yawns, stretches out its canvas:
we paint each one, full to its frame,
with paddle-stroke and pedal-turn.
Gnarled pollards edge the patchwork,
squat its banks like old anglers, hollowed out.
Beyond a tumble of purple loosestrife and fallen trunks,
a dagger beak rises through poplars:
hooked and trailing legs are carried out of sight
by huge, deliberate flaps.
Our barque zig-zags through lime tarmac:
the conche’s lush silence disturbed
only by frog-splashed gashes in its duckweed,
an iridescent flash of Kingfisher,
and family disputes over navigation.
Market
garden mojettes yield
to
sunflowers in their day-glow pomp:
emergent
from a dappled maze
we track the levee dividing
wet from dry,
wheeling, like kites over
treeless meadows,
in search of the next deserted village.
4.
Evening: swallows swoop low,
with chittering swerves, to scoop the pool.
The site settles to after-dinner books, card games
or the shake, rattle and roll of dice.
Two plots along, guttural geese honk evensong;
a bat jags through the twilight.
Out at three a.m. with a bladder full of wine,
the Perseids streak luminous to earth
where fireflies, like cigar stubs, flicker at my feet.
Cassiopeia sits due north, her beauty at its zenith,
and Cygnus has flown from east to west
while I grow old in gazing at such skies.
v.2002 – i.2003
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