Trails of the River Bank
A new poem
The river is not moving this morning.
It’s stillness matching the air above.
The polished surface interrupted by ripples
from fish burps and insects daring a drink.
Somewhere a distant sluice gate must be closed.
We take the bike path towards the red bridge.
It’s too early for wheeled ghosts to surprise us
or joggers to worry us with their sweaty slipstream.
She digs her nose deep into tufts of grass, hoping.
Today she finds no crusts that escaped the beaks.
Ahead a pair of Mallards take a stroll, the drake’s
purple head turned our way in beady lookout.
They choose water as the better part of valour.
On the opposite bank a Heron waits for mistakes.
A grey statue more adept than any street entertainer.
Around the bend Coots fight over water rights
while a mother duck shepherds her brood of fluff.
Numbers are down to six from ten yesterday.
Soon Grebes will be performing choreography,
but for the moment they’re invisibly corralling fish.
We turn for home on a path beside a polder drain
greeted by tiny sunflower-faced celandine
taking in the sunshine before greedy knotweed
and sycamore leaves steal every square metre.
Circle completed, we’re ready for tea and dog biscuits.
Evocative piece chock full of honest observations. The river is not a paradise for what lives there but it gives an overall beauty anyway. Nice place to visit, but then it’s time to go home.
Perceptive as ever CW. I live on the edge of a small town about 100 yards from the river and walk the dog on the bank every day sometimes on a rough path and sometimes on the recreation side. Yes it’s beautiful, it would have been a working river once as its connected to other river systems, but now its used for recreation. The wildlife don’t have it any easier because they live on a pretty river, the ducklings are whittled down by Pike and other predators pretty fast, but there are still plenty of ducks and other bird species… Read more »
Great piece G – we must form a club for dog walking poets and writers!
You can sense the competitive edge that drives all the different species you describe so
well. In life there is conflict and we cannot ignore that, have to live with it, deal with and and even admire it.
Hello, B. I dunno about a club 🙂 but I definitely owe you a big thank you because your excellent poems inspired me to write this little ditty. Ideas have been a bit thin on the ground lately and you encouraged me to get my head moving. I live very close to the river so riverside walks are the norm. Seeing how things change through the seasons is very interesting and I realised it is about time I started to write about it instead of just enjoying the atmosphere. The wildlife have it tough, but in such lovely surrounding it… Read more »
Another excellent word-painting of the countryside – this time a riverine one, and I’d love to join the club, when time permits.
Thanks, Dougie. I’d like to see your take on your countryside. Nature is so important.