Boat piers are much alike.
Stepping ashore at The Stone House,
Doused in the inky stream of Acres Lake
We walk a tarmacadam line
Where curvature comes together
As strands of carmine
Climb through migrant sprays
Of laburnum and maple.
In a wait that slowly accumulates
Until too long, hours refract,
And like a tiptoeing through a glass lean-to
We examine the stills of this romance –
The trays of alpines dusted over,
The hunter’s shot leaving no report,
The tennis court going under –
Trying to fathom that flinty allure
As somehow the wail
Of the long-haul Dublin train
Recalls a man who was falling,
Crying out somewhere
For his coffee-stained hill,
Folding his wings as if all he desired
Was a polished strip
Amongst petrified pines,
Where the stain of silence
Would be heaven sent,
And boat piers would greet the innocent.
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