Piel Island...A Poem for Thursday

 

 I'd been wanting to go to this island for a few years. The last time we made the trip the weather was windy and the Ferryman refused to take us across...who can blame him..the currents alone are treacherous between the mainland...Barrow-in-Furness and the island. This is no ordinary place..it has it's own King and Throne and also  Piel Castle. The Abbott of Furness Abbey owned the rights to all the takings from the sea going craft coming from both Ireland and The Isle-of-Man. It's not touristy and apart from some terraced houses the pub is the only occupied building.
We spent a day just wandering the edge and listening to the skylarks which are everywhere on this little piece of land.

 

Piel Island

 
The skylarks are rising
Drawing me far away
From the nest low in the
Tufts of maran grass that
Grow out of the mussel beach.

I stop to watch their ascent
And listen as the lark
Song joins the soft keening
Of an April wind 'til
Wind takes over and
The bird is lost to my eyes.

Hunter and Hunted

Once again we cycled down to the river.
The weather is on the turn now, but the Ferry area was just as calming.
The gulls were congregated on the bank opposite waiting for the incoming tide.

Why had they risen as one with such noise?

Then we spotted a lone bird hovering over the reeds.

More joined it, until there were four or five of them circling and hovering, still and menacing.

Suddenly up from the reeds came a caccophany of noise as a flock of crows rose high in the sky.

I managed to snap them as they rose.
Only later when I viewed on the Lumix site did I notice in amongst the crows a very different shape......
.......buzzards I'm told!
Nature is so many different things. We love the sense of peace that it can bring us...
.... but abhor the "red in tooth and claw". Yet one cannot be without the other.

Alfred Lord Tennyson wrote as part of the poem In Memorium A.H.H.   these lines......

Are God and Nature then at strife,
That Nature lends such evil dreams?
So careful of the type she seems,
So careless of the single life;

That I, considering everywhere
Her secret meaning in her deeds,
And finding that of fifty seeds
She often brings but one to bear,

I falter where I firmly trod,
And falling with my weight of cares
Upon the great world's altar-stairs
That slope thro' darkness up to God,

I stretch lame hands of faith, and grope,
And gather dust and chaff, and call
To what I feel is Lord of all,
And faintly trust the larger hope.

Under my Nose!

Sometimes the best things are right there under our noses.

This is the view of the river Mersey when drinking "ones" rose' wine at the Ferry Tavern  not far from the Potters House.
Well actuallly the potter has a Guinness!

It's a favourite spot for walkers and bikers and dogs.
Lots of history has gone into the making of the Ferry...obviously once upon a time there was a ferryman.... .....but I've heard that the owner of the distant shore will not allow any landings.

Shame I say!

When the river floods the tavern gets wet! Sometimes the water reaches quite high up the walls.

I have heard that this was the spot where the Romans crossed over after leaving Chester to travel north.
Some early pottery is exhibited in the local museum.

At the back of the inn, parallel to the river, is one of the earliest canals built for the industrial revolution in England.

When we first arrived in the area we often biked down to the Sankey canal with the kids on the back of the bikes.

But in those days it was dirty and smelly.Clogged up with rubbish and discarded metal whatevers.

Now shoals of fish swim in the clear water, while swans and ducks inhabit the reeds along the edges.

 Boats are moored ......

.....and a boatyard rings with the sound of energetic boaty people!

We will be back more regularly...sure......and not only for the Guinness!