#canal poems on Hello Poetry

Toby Lucas Jul 2016

Prowling through the undergrowth
In our barging juggernaut,
Ploughing the rolling hills of water,
Which crease as the narrowboat sluggishly gliding past,
Brushes the bulrushes like a tiger in the reeds.

For four intrepid days
Our film and photographs are empty to show,
No sign, only missed whispers,
Of the hummingbird blue blur.

A darting flash cresting the morning chill,
Regal turquoise stealthily steals
Our attention, our focus, and our tiller
Noses toward the bank hugger.

And we have him.

Small amber-royal fisherman,
Eclipsing his heron heralds
And the swans silent vigil
In majestic lapis lazuli.
Swift and sure he graces the water,
Fisher King,
Which bends beneath his dive.
Resurfacing, his golden breast
Mottled with silver minnow.

There recluse in his exclusive spot,
Fish foundering still in the ******,
The kingfisher's poise frames his catch
Aperture, shutter, captured shot.

Spotting a kingfisher from a canal boat - Summer 2016

#poem #water #birds #canal #kingfisher #birdspotting

Jhilmil Breckenridge Feb 2016

Sometimes if you stop breathing...

sometimes
if you stop breathing
you can hear
you can hear the sound
of the single drop of water
as it drips
onto a bit of tin
amidst the grass and the mud
or the sound of the ducks’
feathers as they play
in the eddies
or the sound of the sun
as it rises over the grey canal
kissing it to life
over treetops that are
japanese watercolours
and boats moored in the marina
memories of a time gone by

sometimes
if you stop breathing
you can feel
you can feel the breeze
on the hair of your arms
the wind as it chills your fingers
and you exhale
dragon breath
sometimes
if you stop breathing
you can feel
life
in death

sometimes
if you stop breathing
you gasp
as you take in the details
the masthead
on a boat
a dragon
with horns?
a greek god
to keep storms away?
hammered iron and blue
a totem
a good luck charm
a protective spell

sometimes
if you stop breathing
everything fades
and all we have
is the now
the single breath
pain vanishes
and all that remains
is bliss

#life #pain #nature #bliss #photography #breathing #details #england #canal

Harry Randle-Marsh Jan 2016

The Draw

We’re hand in hand and walking, down where the Camden canal runs away from us
and breaks faintly in spires, under the floating patches of, olive tree, street lamps.
She shivers on her cigarette, smoke watching, a furnace strong and foreign,
like the ******* of the incense in Rome, tracing flaming *** trails.
The bird living in my ribcage beats it’s great and terrible wings
again, and has another. I have her cold elbow fit my palm.
The pigeons obliviously sleep to the draw
of that burning London moon.
The draw I feel moving me.
down into the world
that acts as a cellar
to the one we know.
So much colder
than the heat
is, in her
~

#moon #night #cold #rome #draw #london #*** #canal #camden

Tony Luxton Nov 2015

Runcorn: Joining the Transport Revolution

We're boating on Brindley's cut
cruising to the cotton city
Manchester where it all goes on
the engine of our empire.

Eight hours of ease from Top Locks,
meals provided, plenty to see
here on the cutting edge
of British engineering.

A night out on the tiles
then back again to dear old Runcorn,
something to tell our kids,
the start of a transport revolution.

When the Runcorn branch of the Bridgewater Canal first opened special boat trips to Manchester were organised.

#canal #trips #runcorn-bridgewater #opening-boat

— The End —