Sunrise
Mist above the water, and all is rather still.
The pre-dawn echoes Ghosts with toil on sand Heave! hands coal-blackened Steel and strained Straw- ‘n mud- made bricks hard, calloused Call out… creased by toil on iron Strained and splint’ring wood Hewed-stone cascades cascading, pulled, and lifted Toil! onto vessels metal, rolling wheels that move Lift! upon sleepers, rolling logs that carry columns Coal and barrels bringing Screech! Undulation… through the baboon barks: echoes wisping through the whispered wind; whistling with the currents ‘neath the clouds.
The night heads west, decorated with the fires of the past.
The sunrays gaze through time and space from beyond the edges of the turning world; riverside ringing tells and tolls for the chorus emanating from the reeds.
Cranes a-crest the banks attest to the readiness of all for morning.
Sunrise, then, o’er the city of the sceptre; dawn about the fort upon the chasm.
Day 1
A boat went past.
It glided by, atop the river.
It took advice from the current and the breeze and compromised a little in the sunlight…
Image credit – Alan Marshall
william altoft 