Good Friday in St Peter Port - Richard Fleming

Sun warms the rooftops of the old town,
flows between close-built houses like liquid honey
and in the tiny, unkempt gardens slipping down
the hillside, gathers interest like banker’s money.

Gulls stand like weathervanes and face the bay
from chimney pots and leaning chimney stacks;
swallows scythe like scimitars from breaking day
till evening when, with rounded backs,
finance workers ascend the hill, evolving, as they do,
into the dour wife, weary father, wayward son.
From office desk to backyard bar-b-q,
the exodus of bankers has begun.

I pause on narrow steps to mark the view
of painted boats that dip beneath the Castle’s gun,
the sea, out to the islands, unremitting blue,
the distant, crooked rocks where foreign currents run
then, towards the airy summit of this prideful town,
set off, one man ascending, sun-bound, free,
through layers of stillness, soft as eiderdown,
content, this hallowed day, to simply be.

Higher and lighter, the heart, of hope, bereft:
so many yesterdays gone and few tomorrows left.

Richard Fleming

This poem first appeared in The Man Who Landed, as part of A GUERNSEY DOUBLE, a joint collection with poet, Peter Kenny.

For further details and availability of this book please go to http://redhandwriter.blogspot.com