Wyre

Going home 
across the Shard bridge
spanning a rattle-snaked river 
that bites into the Irish sea
cold-bloodedly pumping
into Fleetwood's gaping fish-mouth. 

Here birthmarks 
are branded with icons
like beach lighthouse at Rossall Point
as Northwesterly winds 
whistle across the dinosaur ribbed sands. 

Yet towers still sentinel 
over the dark valley 
riveted in iron, rusted russet
like warships wrought from steel,

but aspire
like a winged-spirit
above backstreet's cobbled lanes
that echo with drunken frenzy.

The river's stenched breath
perfumes the breeze with sewage leaks
as passing tankers head north
and farm slurry seeps into pure veins. 

Distantly, 
Alveley's coalfields fade 
whose ashen sides once licked 
red ulcers with embered tongues. 
Their slag banks were stacked 
near St Michael's 
whose hidden eddies still swollow
many a beautifully troubled mind.

Now the future skies 
spread star-spangled
glowing with fractured light
sparks that guide strangers 
embracing Morecambe bay's wide  
open seas
Copyright © | Year Posted 2023

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