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0 Comments | Aug 31, 2022

Chalk River Wensum

hd-wallpaper-5855081_1920Just a bit outside Norwich

in the east of England,

Sarah lives

in a tiny thatch-roof cottage

on the gentle green banks

of the chalk River Wensum.

 
Mayflies cavort upon the water,

delight for brown trout.

Otter and kingfisher contemplate one another

but have little to say, while

whorl snail and white-clawed crayfish

conspire in the chilly mud below.

 
Behind Sarah’s cottage,

a small garden

mostly tends itself.

She sits there each evening,

delighting in the acrobatics of swallows,

the silent creep of the vole,

the lumbering waddle of the badger.

 
With the cottage and the garden

and the wandering Wensum,

Sarah needs nothing more.

And as the evening sun sets

beyond the unkempt hedge,

its last sliver of light

fallen from sight,

she clips a small bundle

of wild grape hyacinth.

 

Carefully trimming the stems

she places them in a vase

in the center of the kitchen table,

where they will stand,

sentinel of nighttime,

until the garden and the Wensum

awake once more.

 

August 31, 2022

Brian Kenneth Swain

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