Issue 3: September 2003
Rhian Gallagher | A.B. Jackson | John McAuliffe | Jane Routh | Sarah Wardle
JANE ROUTH
from Signal Flags
Signal Flag T: I am engaged in pair trawling
Tango
We exchange an unexpected tropical storm,
the sea smoking with black rain squalls
for an Indian summer,
tomatoes ripening late into October.
For his repairs to the main alternator
and forward bilge pump, I offer
a blocked septic tank outfall:
each of us construes a life
of small difficulties and fortitude.
We no longer speak about the past.
But nothing dissipates, energy's constant:
the storm that had him run for shelter,
put two anchors down and drop the bimini
tracked north. It veered south-east, collapsed
then re-formed in mid-Atlantic as Low G.
In two weeks' time it will rattle my doors
and break the tops off young ash trees
still heavy with this season's growth.
Graveyard
beloved wet grasses
dearly beloved rosebay willow herb
treasured memories of dandelion and dock
of your charity pray for the repose of the souls of
the first winded brown sycamore leaves
also
a young birch
aged 2 years and 2 months
also
a holly seedling
aged 11 weeks
also
a bird-sown rowan
who died aged 11 months
tree roots canting stones
in affectionate remembrance of lady fern
wife of brambles
and a handful of dry and seedy blackberries
relict of the above
here lieth the body
sacred
The Silvery Sea
sank 14th June 1998
Not in Rockall, Bailey or South East Iceland
nor in rips and overfalls off Duncansby Head;
not in storm force 10 or poor visibility;
not with light icing on the gear,
the barometer falling rapidly;
not from an open boat with canvas and oars,
in history
but now,
in the present tense
from a well-found purser more than 200 tons
with radar and GPS on a fine June morning
and in sight of the coast of Denmark,
there are empty liferafts and an oil slick
on the silvery sea.
And the sand eels
caught for top heavy tanks
that balance the books but not nature
are back in the sands 100 feet down
taking with them Zander and Tucker,
Michael, Billy and Druimdhu,
down
to the never-named fear
they held in their hearts
(a snagged net, an ankle gripped
by uncoiling wire ropes)
— the fear that has men
never learn to swim, has them
make peace with their women
— and with their God-each time
before the isophase light
on the east end of the pier
slips past to port.
Jane Routh is a photographer and writer from the Forest of Bowland, North Lancashire, where she manages woodlands and a flock of geese.
First collection available from Amazon.co.uk: Circumnavigation (Smith/Doorstop, 2002).