Friday, 13 June 2025

WALK LIKE A CORMORANT... (My poem about a cormorant walking in mud, Padstow harbour, November 2019...)

 Walk Like A Cormorant…

(A muddy harbour at Padstow, November 2019…)



Incessant rain fell upon Padstow’s quay,

The harbour emptied of its locked-in sea,

Leaving behind a sinuous, slick slime

Like that in the estuary when the tide is low…


A cormorant, keen but with misguided audacity

Then began to stride forth, stumbling in the mire,

Once tumbling forwards into the grime,

Its webbed feet’s progress curious, stuttering and slow…


Soon though the diver, out of sheer necessity

Began to flap its wide dark wings as it trod,

Performing an ungainly dance, ridiculously sublime,

In a reeling, floundering, staggering show… 


Pete Ray




Thursday 14th November 2019 and Padstow was being rained upon.


The harbour had been drained of its sea water and a 

cormorant decided to take a walk in the thick, sticky mud towards a small vessel.


It fell forwards once and wobbled about like it had consumed several pints of Korev in a local bar…


Then it used its wings in an attempt to steady itself, which only served to make more nonsense of the slapstick adventure…


It finally reached the side of the boat, upon which a gull watched the scene, mildly interested but then looked on with scorn as the cormorant’s leap for the side of the vessel failed and it dropped back into the mire… 




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