Here is a moving poem written by Eileen Windridge after one of our
poetry walks in the dunes (in the days when we could meet there and talk and
write together). Although not directly about the dunes, it is a nature poem connecting
to the shore a little further up the Sefton coast . . .
The Arrival of the Pink Footed Geese
The greatest compensation for
summer’s fading glory,
Can sometimes seems so long in
coming:
Well after the first morning nip
had called attention
To something not yet quite
believed, though the quality of light had softened so.
An age it seems since carried
sounds became more muffled
And the hedgerow spiders’ webs
displayed a thousand spangled gems at dawn.
I look and listen out for your
arrival.
Oh yes, wonderful are the turning
leaves to gold and russet;
And what a treat to forage in the
fields; to gather conkers still protected in their prickly shells;
To watch the children crunching
through the gutters with delight;
And taste some of the garden
apple harvest. Yet
For me the best arrives with you.
I wait with practiced patience.
Sometimes September’s nearly over
and expectation still hovers on my margins.
The days grow shorter; gathering
in the logs is now a daily task;
Strictly and Bake-off are in full
flow and late summer clothes have
Long been stowed away.
But when you come, always at the
least expected moment,
While bringing in the wheelie bin
or clearing breakfast things,
I’m stilled.
Just one cry at first, a yell as
if of triumph, taut, loud and heralding,
Before the sky above my world
becomes a ‘V’ of joy.
On and on you come, first this
one leads, now that one takes its turn,
Clamorous and rejoicing; the
drama of it all!
You heroes of the sky, a thousand
mile journey nearly at an end on Marshside’s shore.
My heart leaps in welcome!
How blessed to be alive.
“They’re here!” I call to those
within.
And then all quietens, as you
settle over marshy land to rest.
In all the season’s turning,
you’ll be my company throughout the darkest morns and closing afternoons to
come: signals of wintry hope, healthiness of nature ‘s cycles
turning.
You’ll stay until the call of
home returns, when April’s spring time shoots are growing bolder-
Then you will rise again as one
and take your leave for breeding grounds familiar and feathers new.
Eileen Windridge
