Kite Flying - Shakespeare's Monkeys

Kite Flying

On a beach in Croyde
I flew a kite;
only, it wasn't a kite:
it was a salmon tugging
with verve on long line;
it was striped mackerel
hooked and flailing on feathers;
it was the thrum of blustery sky;
it was a line of refraction
bending between elements
to surge and pull the past.

I am not on a beach in Croyde:
I am kite-high in boyhood;
my heart is weightless,
throbbing up through endless light,
the star-play of high swifts.
I am an acrobat of air
but safely tethered to certain ground;
I won't come down, I won't.

The wind off the sea at Croyde
cuts like scissors
and the salmon breaks away;
the mackerel flap back to waves;
the heavens close over
and I'm reeling-in a kite;
the kite I flew
on a beach in Croyde.

Kat -
I always love the effect of poetic bookends, as it adds a sense of symmetry....and your use of language to carry the reader beyond the page is excellent, as usual......your words evoke an 'Alice in Wonderland' (or would that be Alan in Wonderland??) ambiance, and I find it quite appealing.....good stuff, this......

U668857 -

Thanks, Kat

These little excursions into childhood are very Lewis Carroll - good analogy! I'd forgotten what fun it is to fly a kite....BRgds.,Alan.

Alcuin of York -

Very nice. I too like the bookends, particularly the way you've used it here, not merely to unify the poem, but also to show time's passage. The only line that did not work terribly well was "acrobat of air". Yes, it has assonance, but the "of air" seems redundant. "aerial acrobat" is smoother, but still, we know acrobats tumble in air. I'm not sure how to improve it.

Alcuin

U668857 -

Many thanks, Alcuin. Interesting point re. the "acrobat". It is perhaps almost a tautology; however, I think the preposition justifies it somewhat, conveying the idea almost of assimilation as opposed to merely moving in air...

BRgds.,Alan.