Best Seafront Poems
An old stone cottage stands on the seafront
Abandoned and alone
Windows covered in sea salt and cobwebs
Its history and story unknown
A small white cottage with good bones
That has weathered many a storm
Now unloved and neglected
Still stands steadfast ,proud, yet sadly forlorn
A large stone fireplace graces the front room
Blackened by the years that have withstood the test of time
Giving warmth and comfort to many a soul
Comfort so sublime
I wonder who resided here
Was it a happy home
Was it alive , full of love and laughter
Or harbouring sadness and secrets unknown
I would love to sit inside this cottage
Light the fire and share a cup of tea
So the cottage could tell me its story
Of life as it used to be
A story perhaps of long lost secrets
One of intrigue and mystery
Or maybe just a simple tale
Of a loving family
In appreciation and gratitude for story told
A cuddle it would be
I would visit time and again for the warmth of its fire
And to share another cup of tea!
Silent in its violence
the sun lays ancient fire-fingers
on the heat-scoured concrete of the promenade:
boxy seafront chalets tilting and creaking at angles,
scorched, salt-stiffened gardens,
sand dunes, a screaming blue sea.
It is so difficult to accept a loss, a deprivation.
Innocence flaps its winding sheet behind me,
its mummy cloth of myth.
As from an isolated moon I see
the first cold breaker rush to engulf me -
an underwater undulance,
undercurrents of menace, of malice.
The sand-strewn strand stretches into infinity,
shimmering with the visions, the voices, the echoes,
the faceless departments of government and society.
I watch the insouciant people around me,
they possess a flatness, like blank paper.
They hump and lug plastic picnic paraphernalia,
ridiculously, all beach grime and blistered backs,
reduced to a red cindery glow.
Ice creams, scooped from the freezers
in trinkety seashore shops,
are clutched in sunburnt hands.
They are spreading striped sunbathing mats,
snide and smiling slyly.
Is it a mirage, a delusion,
dredged from the desert-dry air?
The air snags in my throat: the flat summer stench
of warm wood, sun lotion, billowing cotton -
blank but expansive. The creaking, the flapping.
A strange wind howls and banters in my ear
and the train shrieks through its station,
the station of my brain -
a riddled red abyss, poker-hot.
The sun is sinking -
a disc of fire, a blood clot.
Water floods the ridgy shallows,
eddying into treacherous pits.
The black gun muzzle of my mouth
blasts the oxygen from the air.
My nerves a hive of wires suffering
the scarlet atrocities.
Pokers put out my eyes.
Squeezed by the forceps of agony
I see nothing, there is nothing
but a mirage of wavering dunes closing in
and the sea splintering; a multitude of glass glittering.
Our Day Out
Our day out to Wales in the Summer of 1981
In car temperature soars that alike to Lebanon,
Not like the previous year of 1980
When temperatures where more akin to Haiti.
Mark one Cortina of a family friend
Seven of us packed in till journeys end.
Car fumes dilute with stale tree air freshener,
Musky heat smell windows barely ajar
Stomach turns, nausea kicks in
Travel sickness arrives
Pull over the car!
Our Welsh arrival is welcomed by rain
Without this a trip here would never be the same
Ridiculous wellies at the ready and embarassing kagool
Not much different from a day out with school!
Countless gift shops adorn the cobbled streets
Each one identical to the last
Welsh towels, traditional dolls and kiss me quick hats.
These cobbled streets stem the flow of insessent driving rain
Forecast of sun will speed up its refrain,
The break up of clouds and retreat of welsh dragon brollies
Cuts to a sweltering waterfront and melting ice lollies.
Old people hog seafront benches
Cool bags of sandwiches
Some ham some cheese
Cold flasks of teas
Making mockery of the seafront heat
Tartan blankets on knees!
Jingle jangle of keys stating Cymru
Signalling the end of our day out and seaview
Its back to the car and our cramped journey home,
Bank holiday traffic roadworks and cones.
In years to come i would appreciate this place
Beauty on our doorstep Escape from big city pace
Castles of interest, Proud national heritage
More fascinating with age
Its even the place i was to become engaged!
So thanks to my parents for those painful days out
Thankyou to Wales for showing me what you are about
Days out and camping
Coastlines for miles
You have brought me much joy
Rain hail or shine
Copyright
S Rose
windswept windsurfing wallabies warbling whales wailing................................................................................
A pink fish travelling with a tea towel is neither in a rush or dirty. Gridlocked gorillas getting grapes gracefully glide. Seafront mystery in windswept hair carrying a carrot, a jar of mustard, and ten grains of multicoloured rocks. A tambourine on a sponge cake can be beating but not beaten. And a lamb cawl is not a call nor a front crawl so place the gate and door at a sixty degree angle. Many custard cups play hockey with wildebeests in tutus. In a fingerless glove place nine toes, and in a pocket watch place a turning tubular pin. The frost from a llamas horn is neither stagnant or perfumed, it is merely a tidal wave of porridge. Hahaha magniloquent magnolia magnitude making monkfish moussaka. Hahaha equality equals equipment eveningwear xxxxxxx hospitalities Z z Z z Z
The world lies silently sleeping
The day of judgement has come
This day is one of awe and wonder
But feared by many and none
I looked out across the seafront
The waters calm and still
Across the meadow was quiet
Nothing stirred on the hill
Everything was holding its breath
Nothing dare speak or move
Everything waiting, waiting
To see what it’s made to prove
Had we as a world, as one and all
Done enough to make it through?
Only the one who judges and knows
Could tell us what really was true
Fire would consume us all
Or feathers protect us from fate
Depending on the judgement
All we could do was wait
Then very softly from the sky
The feathers, through air and trees
The one who judges sent the sign
And everything moved with ease
The end of days as we knew them
Time to start over and new
The judge had passed his sentence
Repayment was now due
When the wind blows in,
total view is upon us.
No cloud is in sight,
sun drifts low.
Colours everywhere,
bright angels around,
birds flapping their farewell fevers,
paying no attention to our movement.
Slowly towards the seafront,
opens the gate for eternal freedom.
Never look back,
never look back.
Nor take our eyes away from this moment,
because right here forever,
we will stay.
I was looking down at the waves
bicycling along Salerno.
A sea-breeze is the air
from the seafront to the mountain
in every corner of the city.
Passing people enjoy the stroll
being born in a city to be rich.
You traced
A heart in the water
Of a rock pool
In the morning
As we still glowed
From the loving
As milk floats raced
Along the seafront and
Seagulls raided the bins
But later...
Time fell into the tide
And when we talked
It became heavily conjunctive
And we lost it all
Suddener
As we could ever have imagined
Because you never
Knew the difference
Between you
And what you said.
A not-quite-there longing for somewhere
not quite home. A transient town with a
shifting population: three-year stint students
refreshed each September like a busy webpage,
locals who’ve lived there for years like anywhere,
visitors who come and go and occasionally
never leave. It’s a bubble on the Welsh coast,
a semi-urban jigsaw of business and learning
in the vertigo of hills and sea. It’s a safety net
for the semi-lost or the liminals, a merperson
of a town. Abersick: a common term to describe
the vertiginous nostalgia that can occur once gone.
Nothing concrete; a faint yearning for something
that only really exists in your mind, nothing
you could put your finger on. Like thoughts.
There’s a strange energy to the town that
pulses in the tides. It’s the sort of feeling that
pulls in your chest like magnets or pheromones,
makes you want to run forever down a stormy seafront
or leap into the windy sky and fly. In Aberystwyth,
you can do anything. Abersickness: the state of
missing a town that feels like home. It’s physical,
sharpens like salt in your veins and spins your mind.
Once Aber’s in your blood, you’ll never leave.
Upon the silent seafront under the scorching summer sun,
I hear a voice that cries out soft and faint as it sounded,
"O ci którzy mogliby mnie pomagac, daj mi! Daj mi!"
"It's on my head you stood, tall and vibrant under the watchful eyes of the blue sky.
Listen you!
I am a traveller from a far away antique land,
Whose shattered visage lies, whose cries tell tales of cuffed hands in the sand.
I am with whom by myself I define, in the eye of God a man, the egregious egoist,
And in the eyes of other men, the enormous load, the outcast old psychopath.
Listen you!
In these winds that bleed the quietest of all my taints and troubles, I complain not,
And by the thundery roars of the rains and all the fears and scares they give me, I manage a smile,
I am a traveller in a desolate land, unaware of whom I have become.
Poem by HUDHAIFAH
As one walks along the seafront
tune in to the waves breaking forth
especially as the winds are in full force
there's a sound so loud it feels hoarse
Across the world the sounds not the same
so many oceans have their own voice
a perspective so different from one another
listen in depth so then you have a choice
In my native Scotland on the Clyde
the wind was causing waves to crash
with sounds aggressive but true
which tells you stay calm, no rash
Walking along a very hot seafront
Fuerteventura Island was my place
watching waves speak words so still
makes one ponder to find my space
Stroll along the Indian Ocean
the waters running over my toes
listening intently ear ever open
here in South Africa cover my woes
(Quote:
"I was born with the ability to hear the sea speak, she had so much to say, it broke my heart." - Anon. )
Illness is not something to desire around us
Living without diseases, it is a prayer of everyone.
Life has no guarantee as many poets gone to rest.
Now, Covid is the top illness that killed many people
Expecting to meet with some poets survivors of Covid,
So we can hug and take some black coffee at any
Seafront restaurants in the World.
Written March 01/2023
For poetry contest sponsored by Constance la France
Theme chosen: illness
...Second place win
In the Contest...
Sand castles
Seashore artifacts;
Seagulls for company
Morning fitness run
Winding jogging track;
Pulse of adrenaline
Salty sea breeze
Coconut palms sway;
Stray voices unfurl
Flower carpet
Yellow and red hues;
Jogging track surprise
Seaside horizon
Sun and sand and mist;
Nature makes pictures
Piquant conversations
Seafront gathering;
Message in skyline
Oh Mr Corbyn please
When I was young, life was fun,
My job was to take a role,
In helping elderly, in various places,
Some posh establishments, airs and graces,
But then there were those council homes,
Cabbage urea nightmares, folk sat alone,
Few staff behind wall,
Funded governments rise and fall,
A mortuary of those still living,
Whilst my mums private nursing place,
Had her running, finding space,
To help another old smiling face,
As she took profit to the ballet,
Or coach trips to Hayling seafront,
Folk there still died, it cannot be denied,
But they did so smiling, still with pride,
So Mr Corbyn please, do not be a politician,
Trying to use old people's lives for populist decisions,
State funded homes never ever worked,
It's not the solution, just a socialist delusion,
And at the end it should be the elderly that matter!
@Andrew Carnegie, Horrified in Wiltshire, 14th Jan 2017.
Start wondering
Awesome miracles speak;
True hearts know
~~~~~~~~~
Calm morning floats
Temporary silence;
Noise ushers toil
~~~~~~~~~
In-between worlds
Cross over now;
Departure awaits
~~~~~~~~~
Words on paper
Strains meander;
Touching pulse
~~~~~~~~~
Voice beyond voice
Silent rapture thrills;
Word beyond words
~~~~~~~~~
Down the winding road
Heavy footfalls;
Darkness masquerades
~~~~~~~~~
Grand old lady
Hurling haiku moments;
Touch of magic
~~~~~~~~~
Poise in sure voice
Brief lines saunter;
No need to rush
~~~~~~~~~
City skyline
Sunset horizon;
Nightfall curtains
~~~~~~~~~
Seafront view
Cityscape deserted;
Evening descends
~~~~~~~~~
Write a haiku
Stack a senryu;
Spirits move
~~~~~~~~~
Leon Enriquez
01 November 2014
Singapore