A city on the sea

I RECENTLY returned from my annual family holiday to Lowestoft, where I stayed in Pakefield.

I was very interested by the many large container ships visable offshore.

When returning from the Norwich/Sunderland match the sight of all the ships' lights offshore looked to me like a city on the horizon. I am a budding, creative writer of both poetry and prose and I felt inspired.

During the week I sat and wrote the attached poem, "A City on the Sea'.

I went down to the beach today,

To see the sea and sky,

But I saw, just off the shore,

The ships, those distant specks,

Stark against the light,

All there, in majestic single file, their reds and blues

So different to the sea.

By day they waited, floating there,

As the world just passed them by,

Their long shapes in silhouette as

The sun splintered off the water.

But by night those ships became

A city on the sea,

A solid line of yellow lights

Against the ink black waves and velvet sky,

Complete with silver moon.

Another world just beyond the horizon,

Their glowing, glinting lights our only glimpse,

Our only insight.

A red light suddenly winks at me, as if in greeting,

Before it fades, swallowed up by the dark.

This ghostly city, so eerily still in the blackness of the night.

But by day I come again, to watch the sea and sky,

Wandering along a cliff top, the city gone from sight,

For ships once more, just off the shore,

They bob and float and stay.

The city faded, now ships remain

Until the turn of day,

When once more, just off the shore,

A city on the sea.

GLYNNIS MORGAN

Garth Road

Morden

Surrey