As promised, here are some images to accompany the next poem to be posted. The old boat returning to nature is known locally as the Saltmills boat, her last voyage was to that stretch of the Wexford coast and now she slowly becomes part of the shingle, eventually to be some flotsam and jetsam, perhaps a few rusted bolts and nails among storm tossed seaweed, bleaching in the summer sun. I’ve been watching her slow decay for many years now. Leaning on the parapet of an old bridge, hundreds of years old, while musing upon the shifting sands of an estuary can be soothing, meditation in it’s way.
The rigging you can see is part of the mainmast of a Famine -era sailing ship, “The Dunbrody”, moored in New Ross. The poem I will be uploading to accompany these pictures is about a ship from that era, “The Earl of Sandwich.” There is, to my eye, something stirring about the majestic sailing ships. It is to be heard in the lovely poem “Sea Fever” by John Masefield.
“I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky.
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by;
And the wheels kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking
And agree mist on the sea’s face, and a grey dawn breaking.”
More to follow!!!
