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David Selzer is a writer of poetry, prose fiction, screenplays and stage plays. He embraces digital platforms to share his work of more than fifty years… READ MORE
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SAND FLATS AT WEST KIRBY
At low water the sand flats stretch unbroken
down the Dee estuary’s English coast
to the reed beds of Parkgate and Burton Marsh;
stretch beyond the islands in the river’s mouth –
Hilbre, Middle Eye and Little Eye –
towards the wind turbines in Liverpool Bay;
then along the head of the Peninsula,
past Meols, Leasowe, Wallasey and New Brighton,
to join the mudflats of the Mersey.
At low water the sand flats are safe to cross
to the islands – and you might feel you could walk
to that wind farm on Burbo Bank, or walk
to Wales and reach Snowdonia’s ranges,
despite the channels you cannot see,
and the waves encroaching which you cannot hear,
let alone see, because of the constant sound
of endless, restless, distant waters.
Here are such large skies of shifting clouds,
long veils of rain, unbroken sunlight –
such immense firmaments. This is a place
of horizons and mirage, of disquiet,
and exhilaration, like a lost element,
a lost dimension, as if you might glimpse
heaven or angels, or whatever else
may be at the world’s edge.
3 responses to “SAND FLATS AT WEST KIRBY”
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Love the names, only to be subsumed in the mystery of landsend, lifesend. How the lost elements tempt us on.
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A most evocative poem, David, especially for a reader like myself who knows well the view you are describing; but in fact your poem should resonate with those who do not know it. The last few lines are particularly strong – a conclusion that does not conclude but, rather, opens up very beautifully. For me (and for Irene) the passage about the deceptiveness of the mud has a personal resonance. As you know, in January 1979 we nearly lost one of our children to the mud at Caldy Beach. (There is a short poem about this in my first book.)
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Fine poem about our unknown dramatic coast. I remember a TV cop show – Z Cars? – where the bad guys tried to escape on foot across those flats to Wales. It didn’t end well for them. And years later I learned that Olaf Stapleton – author of massive, imaginative, pointless future histories of mankind – lived in Meols. The world’s edge indeed!
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