One day we will live by the sea,
take our time like we always said.
We shall walk along the strand
come rain or shine,
while dinner cooks slowly back home.
Though we won’t have much,
we won’t ask for any more: it will be enough.
Contentment is making do,
inevitable like the tides,
the changing season
and the portals of life
copyright Francis Barker 2020
We were based in Belfast, an up and coming city with a proud industrial heritage, particularly in ship building. It was here, of course, where the legendary ocean liner, The Titanic was built.
In more recent times, though, Belfast has been blighted by what was called ‘The Troubles’. Thankfully, those days are long gone but the scars remain. I won’t talk about those times right now.
No, I want to talk about the County Antrim coast road, which takes you around the northern tip of the island of Ireland.
I have scarcely seen such beauty, anywhere; the fantastic vistas out to sea, atmospheric views across to Scotland and the Mull of Kintyre; the wonderful, secluded, almost deserted beaches.
And then of course sensational spots like the Giants Causeway.
In fact, words almost fail, except to say that property sales particulars were consulted. Simply wonderful.
There will be more pictures to follow in future pieces on the fabulous little corner of the world.
copyright Leofwine Tanner 2019
Bede
It wasn’t at Jarrow where I sensed you
but on Bamburgh’s raging shore,
among the seaweed and razor shells
on gull peppered sands,
its castle brooding behind me
like a huge chiseled tomb.
North waves were scrambling,
spilling memories of guttural voices
disguised in flushing sound;
cries of songs, harps and old tales lost,
fragments I could almost hear
when I turned my head into the wind.
And who was the black figure
bent against the breeze,
absorbing sharp light
on that blinding beach?
I struggled through the dunes,
the little islands of sparse grass
and pygmy flowers —
but you were gone,
extant only in memory,
my boundless imagination,
and in your books
which carry me through centuries
on a primal wave,
each time I read your words
Poem and image © copyright df barker 2012
Sea Wall
Stand and look from here,
you can see the earth’s curve,
a sea-levelled land
bereft of its mother.
Shells we have found
while the silt blew away,
powdered by droughts
and the pitiless wind.
Stand here with me
at the high spring tide—
you know the stark sea
will swell all over this again
poem © copyright df barker 2012
Beachcombing
We set out one morning
after the rain had cleared.
Not a breath of wind,
loose clothes sticking to my skin.
Our intention was to search
the shallow beach,
stretching so far ahead of us
towards lights on low, murky cliffs—
baleful beacons through the mist.
“Stop there!” you said
and took that picture of me,
my trousers rolled up;
never the most fetching sight.
“Walking on water,” that’s
what you called it right away:
Maybe this was the closest
we ever got to heaven
poem and image © copyright df barker 2012
Ciscography 