FROM THE RUINS

You are old enough now to remember this.

The overhead power line at the cottage

meant we could not fly the new kite there.

I knew a field five minutes away

with a ruined medieval chapel

and a view down the slope to a bay

where hundreds of souls drowned in a fabled storm.

But we told you of the space and the wind.

Your daddy showed you how to fly the kite

while your mummy, grandma and me went

to church! Vestiges of paint remained

though the weathers of centuries had scrubbed

the internal walls of most of the murals.

Through the arches of the chancel window,

we saw you flying your kite: serious,

already skilled by a good teacher.

You managed the controls, intuitively

aware of aero dynamics, like

some latter-day Daedalus, as the kite,

mass produced sky blue plastic from China,

bucked and soared in the prevailing westerly.

Rightly oblivious of history,

you were a five year old Benjamin Franklin

looking to steal heaven’s thunder and lightning.