Ynys Mon

POETRY

A VIEW OF THE STRAITS

By David SelzerAugust 25, 20173 Comments1 min read1.6K views

The image has stayed with me since last summer

when we sat on the restaurant’s terrace

sipping Prosecco with our small family

to celebrate our first fifty years

of marriage: a view I had not seen before

of these straits I thought I knew so well

between Ynys Môn and Gwynedd’s coast,

a view – past Bangor Pier and Gallow’s Point,

over the Lavan Sands and Dutchman’s Bank

hidden beneath the high tide’s guileful waters –

to the rose horizon, and Liverpool Bay

out of sight with its wrecks and wind farms.

And I felt then – relaxed with the balm

of the sun, the wine, and those I am

lucky enough to love – and know now

with the wisdom of a year ever closer

to that untravelled bourn, how, irrespective

of the heart’s gazetteer, its topography,

all love comes unbidden like the elements.

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POETRY

SIDE BY SIDE

By David SelzerFebruary 27, 20163 Comments2 min read1.9K views

For you and me, like Henry Moore’s bronze
kings and queens, there is something very
special about sitting together
on a public seat with a majestic view…

***

On the erstwhile Exxon Valdez ride
at the ’90s Epcot Centre, plunging
above Alaska with a dying friend…

Snow falling on Halkyn Mountain over
the estuary from Parkgate promenade
and a fire briefly flaring then dying
by Flint Castle on the distant shore…

A child begging on the corniche at Luxor,
singing, ‘Michael, row the boat ashore,’
and the crowded ferry crossing the Nile…

‘John Williams, Plumber, A Deganwy Lad’,
with a view of Penmaenmawr – Wagnerian,
mauve against the bright sky above Ynys Môn –
the bench washed away in a freak storm…

Beside The Lake in Central Park, early
September before 9/11,
the row boats empty in the humid air…

***

Relaxing on the cruiser at Edfu
with mint tea after a temple visit –
on the road, a camel and donkey
passing in the back of a pick-up…

On the steps of the Community Hall
where Mandela trained to box, next to
a serious queue for a bouncy castle…

Opposite Conwy Castle, the curlews
and the shelduck on the sand banks at low tide –
in the channel along the far bank
a water skier buzzing, buzzing…

Next to the river and the Peter the Great
fantasy statue, in the Monument Park,
with Dzerzhinsky facing his future…

Market Street, Jozi, with the theatre
and bookstalls – and its environs safe
again but at what cost to the homeless
who squatted in the windowless buildings…

***

On the topmost row of the amphitheatre
at Epidaurus, dusk settling among
the olive groves and the tourist buses…

On the beach at Alvor – where Portugal
ceded Mozambique to Frelimo
in a country club – with North Africa
seemingly just beyond the horizon…

In the grounds of the Hector Pieterson
Museum, with the liberated traffic
of Orlando West careering by…

Etna rising in mist from Taormina’s
Giardini Villa Communale
with its avenue of olive trees,
each a memorial to the naval dead…

In Polesdon Lacey’s rose garden,
designed by the playwright Sheridan,
with cattle lowing below the terrace…

***

Ah, to have such promising prospects, the first
of Disneyland, the last of England – somewhere,
looking forward, to imagine the worst,
to speak of the past, to learn to know blessings…

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POETRY

CAER LÊB, YNYS MÔN

By David SelzerJune 20, 20150 Comments1 min read1.4K views

A blackbird is singing in a distant oak.
Now that the may blossom has fallen
the hawthorn is festooned with a white,
wild clematis – traveller’s joy or
old man’s beard. Hereabouts, people have
hunted, gathered, built, farmed, worshipped,
imagined – and some, undoubtedly, thieved
and murdered – in a continuing commune
for at least six thousand years and more,
longer than Babylon, longer than Rome.

It is nothing compared with the stars,
which most of them will have marvelled at,
but, nevertheless, it seems worth noting.
As well as the exactitude of books,
history is written in earth works,
standing stones, a copper coin and a mound
of periwinkle shells.

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POETRY

SAFELY THROUGH THE DARK

By David SelzerOctober 29, 20121 Comment1 min read1.5K views

At twilight from the hills across the Straits, a sudden

drift of smoke – then a fire’s deep orange eye blinked.

We talked of cruising the Nile; of moon rise and sun set,

of the narrow compass of the earth’s curve;

the river pilots’ open armed, hand-on-heart salaams;

and the stars rushing through the night.

Later and sleepless in the early hours,

I kept watch at the bedroom window.

The hotel sign lit a faded Union flag,

threadbare at its outer edges.

The only hint of the far shore was

sporadic lights on the A55.

But the stars were unequivocal. In a cloudless,

unpolluted sky, how they teemed!

I saw the constellations pass

and the random magnificence of things revealed.

Understandably, you preferred to sleep.

And journey safely through the dark.

Note: The poem was originally published on the site in October 2009, under the title, BULKELEY HOTEL, BEAUMARIS, YNYS MÔN – https://davidselzer.com/2009/10/

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By David Selzer

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POETRY