Canal
By Luly Whisper
- 1080 reads
There stands a bronze James Brindley,
O'er his proposal bent
To join the Thames and Mersey,
The Severn and the Trent
He did this waterway create
In the year 1768.
How quietly the wharves are sleeping now!
I've left behind the carnival, the show,
The crowds of shoppers, whining kids in tow.
Here the shops sell pictures, gifts, tattoos,
But their proprietors sit outside and wait.
Stare across at the humble grey sheds,
At the painted narrowboats, and wait.
I follow Brindley's gaze. A linear park!
Fradley, Braunston, Banbury, here we come!
The water-level nearly to the path
Between the railings and the buildings' bulk.
The modern flats that look like warehouses;
Real warehouses at peace. Electric Wharf
Is here, and where the Daimler cars were built,
And Cash's top-shops, where the weavers wove,
Turned into bijou residences.
And backs of terraces, and rubbish, and beyond
A 'sixties tower block, all white and grey.
But here it is so still, and mallards swim,
And honey-scented buddleia abounds
In this lush passage. Coots and moorhens lead
Their fledglings, and a stately standing swan
Spits at my passing. Cygnets must be near.
And here is purple willow-herb, and this
Cream-frothing flower must be meadowsweet,
That grows in marshland. Something breaks the surface
Of the dark water. Breezes stroke my skin.
A bend, a bridge, a redbrick tower revealed
Above the foliage of the Summer trees.
There Courtauld's factory once spun its thread.
I used to look down here from the bus
And wonder where this path I'm on must lead.
And further on, two men rest on a form
Shaped like a coil of rope. The sun's gone in.
My feet are sore. I join the Foleshill Road.
And maybe he would like it too,
And as we walked along
I'd tell him what the place was like
In 1961.
But he's not here, and anyway
Perhaps he wouldn't care,
But he will mind if he gets home
And dinner isn't there.
So as I face the crowds again
Among the streets I've known,
I'll stop for neither food nor drink
But catch the next train home.
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Comments
Hi luly whisper, What a
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In the third stanza, do you
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