Donna Nook

Donna Nook

 

Far out at sea

hazy blue merges into hazy blue,

only the tanker pinned to the invisible horizon,

waiting for the tide to turn,

indicates where ocean ends and sky begins.

 

There is no wind

and the unseasonable sun is warm.

A strange odour drifts ashore,

musty and musky, oily and slightly fishy,

a scent of blood and birth.

 

The beach belongs to the seals,

protected from the throngs of watchers by the fence,

the winter shadows of posts and people alike

cast long across the sands, striping the sleeping cows,

shading the newborn pups close to the dunes.

 

The beasts doze, apparently smiling in the November sun,

yawn, stretch, roll, and doze again, murmuring in their dreams

of fish shoals in the green depths, stir briefly to lumber,

clumsily, to muddy creek and back, wakening to call

their haunting, complaining moan, checking that their pups are close.

 

A wagtail runs along the creek, snapping at insects, a pipit

stalks the stunted vegetation, a magpie lurks with gulls,

seeking the red-splashed afterbirths.

Redshanks flute from distant pools,

but the beach belongs entirely to the breeding seals.

 

Confrontation arises suddenly:

a youngster has shuffled close to the wrong female,

its mother snarls at the unsuspecting cow,.

showing teeth and gaping pink mouth:

a brief scuffle ensues, more noise than action,

then both retreat as junior scuttles back into safe territory,

the cows resume their benevolent passivity,

settle back into the important business of slumber.

 

The short afternoon draws to a quiet close,

shadows lengthen, buckthorn berries glow

in the early dusk, the visitors trickle homewards,]

and the seals sleep on.

 

Published in Sarasvati June 2011.

 

Done