Curlew Call

Curlew

Low in the strand you stand against the rising tide, and spew of foam;
Your gentle call sings out beyond the frost of winter’s dying day.

A sound of summer; of heath blown hills; wide skies that spring bright:
To meet the hill cloaked heather banks.

You stalk the strand line mounds of storm tossed kelp;
To gleam the morsels, rimmed with salt and pass on.

Your sweet harvest of the lean and darkening air:
Hero of folklore by your liquid call; that bubbles all across the chill land.

Pale inner wing flash in gloaming light; to walk the sea fast pastures;
Beyond the turn of tide.

I too sing for joy to hear your song;
See you strut among the wading flocks again.

In gloom a promise to you; do I make:
We’ll meet again on moorlands heady height and see the summer through.

By rank rough pastures of the hefted sheep;
Together praise the azure sky beyond the long edge of day.