Wivenhoe Flats
The sky glares, February blue,
And a low white sun polishes
The river's silver scribble.
Behind, the tumble of Rowhedge
Is moored in the mud.
Safe above the barrier
The scrubbed flats' grasses
Lie close as cats' ears
And the jetsam of the last-ever spring tide
Beds under shallow roots.
Tar knotted rope, Castrol cans
And all the plunder of the salt seas
Settle like silt.
Three swans pad the mud,
A child's shout shimmers on the scouring air.
Soon the river's frayed edge
Will be stitched with red brick and hardwood gables,
Renamed Bargee's Wharf
Or Plover's Landing,
And the unholy jumble of estuary scrap
Will be tidied forever.
Forever,
Until the North Seas bulge one spring
And push a little harder, further, higher