ESTUARY GIANTS - POEM BY STUART BRANCH

ESTUARY GIANTS.

The Estuary seems, lifeless, denuded,

As empty as the salt flats, when the sea runs not o’er them,

As, untraveled and  passed  by, as when spillage on to a road, snuffs all movement,

No, these little mini-ships, out there today, do not do justice to this great Tidal stream which flows 

Past our New City by the sea, to that Great World City, spread out, upstream,

They would fill, only the thinnest sliver of the extreme edge of an artists’ sketch sheet,

Emptiness would fill the rest, waiting and longing, to bring on the Giants,

A pair, one in, one out, our Imports, our Exports, filling up, seaward bareness,

As one slips in from the Towers of Nore, crossing at Thorpe Bay, with its mammoth Leviathan of a brother, like two giant elephants, fusing.

This is a moment, when all onlookers, look out,

When Southenders forget their dogs and gaze in size-drunken awe,

It is that moment, of huge passing,

Of height and bulk of scene-filled, thunderous, throbbing, 

Our Estuary, is full,

It needs, no more,

It thirsts, not even, for one more ship,

It is enough! - magnificence, has conquered!

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