Clovelly

I walk worn cobbled steps on Clovelly’s hill,

The steep slope banked by white-washed houses.

A shell of baked clay bricks stands empty,

Cracked pane round dusty windowsill,

Half-melted candle melding into dark;

Blue flakes of paint arch from the wooden door,

Ringed round by horseshoes

From the smithy’s flames,

Cut loose from hooves, worn no more.

 

A lean-to shack props up

A lean-to man who never speaks,

Puffing on a long-stemmed pipe

Made from reclaimed hull, a Caribbean teak.

 

My careful steps lead to the quays,

Bobbing lobster pots and lonely buoys;

A fisherman mends nets

Wrapped in tar-stained fleece,

Then turns and casts.  The sea

Is not grey-green brine but long-forgotten faces

Gazing back at me,

Their hair rimed thick with dust

Skulls smiling back in sad apology.

 

Some I remember; all I’ve met

And so I smile in turn.

 

I walk past broken skiffs

Along more cobbles

(Now moss-grown teeth

Claimed by the Lichen King)

And the path weaves round a rise

Down to white-chalked cliffs.

 

Buzzards glide and bracken sways,

My uncle beckons

But as I walk to him, he fades away.

I stand alone where he just stood,

Limned round with rocks

Laid by some old hand I never knew,

My cairn half-built,

Sunset fading on the day.