Between two bridges I fish <br />The Stour in winter. <br />The river is traumatised and <br />Skittish after rain three days solid, <br /> <br />Unsettled its dimensions, <br />And carved an old willows <br />Feet away to drown his <br />Gangly torso and limbs in the margins. <br /> <br />The flow skirts around him like <br />A politician, creating a back eddy <br />That pulls and worries at my float; <br />Its bright orange tip at odds <br />With the sepia wash of winter. <br /> <br />The nearest bridge is a century old <br />and a pleasing bird`s egg blue. <br />Occasional traffic rattles its roadway, <br />And its pillars resonate, transmitting <br />Circular ripples through the water <br />The colour of builders` tea; <br /> <br />While the furthest bridge sixty yards upstream <br />Spanned the river for trains that served a district line, <br />Before Beeching swung his axe and <br />Inconvenienced the nation. Sedate feet and cycles <br />Have replaced the clattering iron and steam <br />That sent swans stumbling skywards. <br /> <br />In the summer when the river is a window, <br />Like a little hint of Atlantis <br />Two old bridge pillars are visible, <br />Encircled by wafting green tendrils <br />Of streamer weed that reach out <br />To burnish the silver flanks, <br />And buff the blood-red fins of passing roach shoals. <br /> <br />Opposite my swim, standing amongst <br />Papery-brown vegetation <br />Like summers shed-skin, <br />Is a true fisherman. In professorial grey-gown, <br />Stilt-legged and spear-beaked, <br />A heron basks in skills a million years deep; <br /> <br />That within minutes awards him a perch <br />the size of a man`s hand, <br />While I remain fishless, and frozen; <br />The only heat of the day arising <br />From the point <br />Where pen meets paper.<br /><br />Bob Dellar<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-river-between-the-bridges/
