BESSIE'S COVE, CORNWALL: A POEM...

Bessie’s Cove

Sea-eagle sprawls

Like a shoebill stork

Flailing after lungfish

Onto the incoming tide;

Harsh-eyed,

Precision-beaked,

The Cove it trawls;

Seeks its prey,

Seeks to spear,

Seeks its plunder,

Seeks to spread fear.

Surfacing seal appears

Like a deep-sea diver

Rising for bearings

On the incoming tide;

Wide-eyed,

Round-headed,

The Cove it nears;

Seeks no foe,

Seeks to feed,

Seeks no danger,

Seeks satiation of need.

Suspended boat angles

Like a stringed toy

Waiting for companions

And the incoming tide;

Cock-eyed,

Halfway-down

The Cove’s slipway dangles;

Seeks a helmsman,

Seeks two oars,

Seeks its freedom, 

Seeks the Cove’s jaws.

Pete Ray

November 2007

BEAR LEFT FROM THE TWO TREES, CENTRE IMAGE, & THERE IS A BIRD'S HEAD...

SEAL...

ROW-BOAT...

BESSIE'S COVE...

THE AUTHOR, 9 YEARS BACK...

The jutting rocks looked rather like the head of a sea-eagle, a seal bobbed in the water and a rowing-boat lay on a slope at Bessie’s Cove.