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The Morning Train

The Hythe has had a shower today

Sluiced the weary night away

The platform, wet from recent rain

Is standing for the London train

In sight of automatic gates

The backbone of the nation waits

The clouds are hanging out to dry

For soon the sun will scale the sky

With gelled-up hair, the younger chaps

And too much aftershave, perhaps

In crumpled jackets, scruffy shoes

Go late to jobs, they'd hate to lose

Yawning then, they find a place

To hide themselves in cyber-space

Sequestered in a comfort zone

Of laptop, i-pod, mobile phone

Somewhere near to Seven Kings

A salesgirl thinks engagement rings

Drains her polystyrene cup

And then, reluctantly, moves up

Recalling waterfront estates

In seats not made for vertebrates

For in the hour or so it takes

The backbone of the nation aches.

Swan Fleet In Winter

White on blue, on white, on blue

The swan fleet winters on the Colne

When the sky is full of snow

And the yellow clouds hang low

Over woods at Wivenhoe.

Cotton-swabs to wipe the make-up

From December's streaky face.

On the river rolling slowly

Through the cold rose afternoon

Feather galleons of the moon.

High above them, gulls manoeuvre

Silver seaplanes headed east.

Far below, a flagship's waiting

Twilight on its icy prow

Captain Frost's expected now.

Stalking, silent, through the coalyard

Stooping cranes and frozen ships

Tapioca dock and warehouse

Haunted, now the men are home

And the mud is dirty chrome.

Here the night squats on the water

And the moonlight's on the snow

While the swan fleet sits at anchor

By the corrugated ridges

Of the quay and concrete bridges.

Where the reeds are bent or broken

And the splintered pallets float

In among the ebbing eddies

Bobbing by the wooden jetty

Glistening with cold confetti.

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