Skomer (Poetry)
11th August 2006
Shrieking gulls drown out the ghosts of Vikings -
these new invaders claimed and colonised
the island in their feathered tens of thousands
and now they rule the cliffs, the sea, the skies.
Seabird cities shudder at the onslaught,
battered by Atlantic gales and swell,
at Pigstone Bay the sea is never placid,
the Sounds' fast currents tug each sail and shell.
Man was here - the flints and ruins prove it -
his prehistoric sites, a trace of fields,
the rabbit-catchers and the patient farmers
dwindled with the land's decreasing yields.
The population now's all seals and puffins,
shearwaters outride wild weather's bluff.
Norsemen came and saw and then departed,
the birds stayed on - evolved from sterner stuff.
This is a watercolour sketch reproduced from the book, David Bellamy's Pembrokeshire, with the kind permission of the copyright holder.
these new invaders claimed and colonised
the island in their feathered tens of thousands
and now they rule the cliffs, the sea, the skies.
Seabird cities shudder at the onslaught,
battered by Atlantic gales and swell,
at Pigstone Bay the sea is never placid,
the Sounds' fast currents tug each sail and shell.
Man was here - the flints and ruins prove it -
his prehistoric sites, a trace of fields,
the rabbit-catchers and the patient farmers
dwindled with the land's decreasing yields.
The population now's all seals and puffins,
shearwaters outride wild weather's bluff.
Norsemen came and saw and then departed,
the birds stayed on - evolved from sterner stuff.
This is a watercolour sketch reproduced from the book, David Bellamy's Pembrokeshire, with the kind permission of the copyright holder.