Journeys and Places

Heathland to Coastline | The Island Beyond | Seeking | The Poetry Evening | In A Desert Place | The Last Boundary | Eucalyptus Wood | Quest | Riding Home

Heathland to Coastline

I walk the path beside the gorse and shrub, beyond
the heather draped like purple cloths against the green,
the green, most green of fern fronds in their last
viridien leafing, defying fading summer and the touch
of cooling Autumn, turning them to roan.
I think of you, walking some sea wrapt bay,
striding a high cliff top, the beach beneath,
with rocks repelling breakers foaming white.

My path turns, here the rose bay willow herb
with flowers of Madder Pink stands tall above
the meadow fescue and the feather grass,
with thistle heads like amethysts between.

I see, with your far distant, gazing eyes
the soaring waves leaping at blackened stone,
the marram grass and silver hollowed dunes,
the light receding on a far horizon.
I feel the sun dried pebbles as you walk,
the breaking shells you crush beneath your feet.
I hear the surge and swell of waves and wind,
I smell the sea wrack cast upon the shore
and taste the salt spray flung upon the air.

And you, lost in your sea-side fantasy,
can I believe that through my eyes you see
the beech, the birch, the ash trees sway,
the green, the gold, the purples and the pinks,
the leaf mast and the sandstone path?
And do you hear the susurrating leaves?
do you feel fronds of bracken on your face,
are scents of purple ling assailing you,
the taste of stuporous pollen in the air?

Are you as close to me, on your far distant coast,
as I am close to you, in heathland and green shade?