Long years secure on shingle bank,
at this margin you have lingered
watching how clouds gather,
then breaking, pass.
Memory, through swash of waves unceasing,
has been in pebbles piled up here.
Repaired, repainted every spring
and coolest number in the row,
B-52 now rides the shore.
Revetments gone, rotten past safekeeping,
the stones are dredged
by fetch of storms set free.
Reaching close and closer still our apron,
each tide reshapes the beach.
This time is sooner than foreseen:
the power of backwash -
creating coasts elsewhere -
we never noticed it before.
v. 2021
A last, leaving poem for my friends in the 'Poets of Greater Havant' workshop. I wanted the evolution of the coast at Hayling (and its impact on a much beloved beach hut) to be a metaphor for both the sadness of departure and the inevitability of change.
ReplyDeleteIt was suggested I amend one of the commas (guess which) to a dash - but I'm still thinking about that!