Aldeburgh Beach (a walk)

The Britten silver shell gleams when the struggling

sun breaks through, and if you listen carefully 

it’s said you can ‘hear those voices 

that will not be drowned’, clinging

to the scolloped edge as the great roar of the waves

crashes down emulating cymbals.  

A crescendo of the shingle rhythm playing out 

old sea shanties, once repeated by the sound of fiddles 

in the snug of smokey alehouses.

Today’s goal, for the salt faced fisherman,

before the tide that waits for no man can wait no more, 

is to repair his tired nets.  His tilted boat,

stuck fast into a pebble wave, leans lonely looking

for sympathy having been jilted by the buoys.

Crunching over unmade sand

where thrift was making crevice homes,

a defiant sweet toned contrast 

against the grey menace of the North Sea,  

we headed inland towards the ‘House In the Clouds’ 

serenely floating 

in front of the vast white nuclear temple dome:

Sizewell A, Sizewell B, 

spews out into the sea

turning shanties to laments.

Wave goodbye to Peter Grimes, 

say hello to empty nets.

© 2006 by P.A.Levy

First published by Busk 2011