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Winter Beach

Remember

The sea assaults

Of winter gales when

Towering spray sheets curl

Over the green-stripe tower

At the harbour mouth

And waves roll shoreward

Beside its jetty

Shingle crashing

Floating spume across the beach

With black stones cold shone by spray

That above the wave thrust

Hides the horizon behind its mist

As the sun shines low

On a December afternoon

...

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Tan-y-Bwlchbeachseastormwavesjettyharbourshinglespume

The Estuary

I am

barefoot

on a far tide line

sand rippled

spread

with estuary shells

with oystercatchers

soft where rills run down

or the sea pools

behind a half-sunk stone

or a mooring chain

I am

watching

moored yachts

swinging to the tide turn

above their sunken reflections

angled lines of cirrostratus

echoed below the horizon

in the mirror gloss sea

...

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beachboatscloudsestuaryreflectionsriversandseaseaweedtidetide line

Images of a High Tide

harbour entrance swell

river bridge

above the beach

the scraping rattle

millions of stones

sucked off the beach

returning to the sea

 

beside the harbour wall

crossing waves

rearing waves

joining

breaking in foam

crashing

onto the shingle

the vast pull

of the receding sea

the undertow of sound

 

the bay

grey brown sea

under a blue sky

...

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beachdriftwodfishing netsharbourseaseagullssurftideundertowwaves

Summer Seascape

In the sun's mid-day heat

I see the tall field grasses flow, swell

and come towards me in waves               

surging before the day's wind

the seed-head spume constantly bowing

seems to fall on the field strand where I stand.

The rhythmic onslaught of the waves

continues through the long afternoon - 

a tide of wind-driven swells and rollers

always flowing to my feet, w...

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beachebbfieldsharvesthayhay fieldsseaswellstidewaveswind

Late September Morn

I, dreamlost,

wake

to golden leaves of beech

sunlit

from my bed

as airdew clouds over the hedge

rise and vanish

as the eastern horizon above the valley

is lost, sunk

beneath dawndrifts of mist

not yet warmed to fade

beneath the clear blue sky;

the uncut grass of the dew-wet lawn,

droplet bent:

cool promise as

I, barefooted,

explore

the cusp of the...

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dawnSeptembersunlightbeachautumndewmistCeredigionWales

The wave behind the wave

From beyond the far horizon arc

travelling travelling calmly on 

to swell gently across a sea

until the deep corals 

are left far behind

and the seabed 

rises sloping up 

to meet land

forcing us

to turn

to curl 

to break

to surge

to rattle stone

to shape sand 

our strength waining 

retreating quietly beneath

the wave behind our wave

a curling s...

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Seawavesswellsbeachshinglesandwave crest

All the Years [revision]

In my mind

buried deep

                a golden grain

                of  Welsh

                beach

In my mind

our impressions

                in the hot sand

                where we

                lay

It is there

buried deep

                that single second

                that moment

                in which our

                minds

        ...

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beachGowerlovePobbles BaysandtimeWales

All the Years

In my mind

buried deep

                a golden grain

                of  Welsh

                beach

In my mind

shallow dips

                in the hot sand

                where we

                lay

It is there

buried deep

                that single second

                that moment

                in which our

                minds

           ...

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beachGowerlovePobbles BaysandtimeWales

The Land of a Giant

Between the dark Ystwyth and the angry sea

We walked the cold stone beach

From the swirling river mouth

To the striated rocks beneath the southern cliff

Their upended strata pointing the way across Tan y Bwlch

Beyond the town beneath its northern cliffs

 

A Celtic god watches and menaces

Black Lugus on Pen ddinas Maelor:

We brave his fierce storms which shade our day

...

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beachseastormwavesflotsammythologyhistoryCeltsCeredigionRiver YstwythPen Dinas MaelorPen y DinasTan Y BwlchcliffsLugusMaelor GawrLleu Llaw Gyffes

Gower

The sand was always hot

                beside the white dunes and the coarse grass

               

The sea was always blue

                between the black rocks and the horizon haze

 

The beach was always ours

                between the seagull shout and the distant crowd

 

We were always alone

               between the far world and our near union

 

We swa...

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beachdunesfutureGowermarriagesandseasouth walesswimmingWales

Forvie, March 2017

Dunes...

And then the sand flowed like the tide

Shifting the land at the wave edge of the sea

A vast striated plane of drifting whirling grains:

Aged dunes lost to the wail will of the wind.

As we walked close by the sea suck and ripple

The bound beach rose and swallowed our grounded feet

We seemed to be free floating sand cloud high

In the sandsmoke drifts rushing to their...

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SandSand stormbeachdunesseaForvieScotlandcoastvillagefishermenchapel

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