Landlocked

The warmth of the sun has soaked into the paving stones and I, unshod, absorb its radiance through my soles. As it rises to its zenith, colour is slowly leached from wild grasses, transforming wiry stalks to hay as it shines on down. A splash of crimson from a solitary poppy breaks up the sepia of parched verges, as the haze rises into still air.

On sun baked days such as these, I miss the salt tang of the sea as it rolls relentlessly onto pebbled shores; clattering stones with sonorous sound to lull and soothe the most jumbled of minds. I long for cool breezes to ruffle skin; raising  goosebumps as I settle back into warm pebbled hollows to gaze at the sharp white sails that drift across the horizon.

I am landlocked; anchored by a river, which, although beautiful in its own way, cannot compete with the great expanse of sea. It ebbs and flows with the tide, creeping to cover rivulets of exposed mud , genteel in its flowing, with none of the wild ferocity the sea brings; the rolling surf, white water waves and taste of salt on sun warmed skin...My feet follow tarmac paths, edged with graffiti and the washed up detritus from passing vessels. Once they balanced down tracks carved from crumbling cliffs, onto shingle that slipped and sighed past beach huts weathered by a thousand storms.

For now, the river will suffice, but soon I shall turn my face south and head for the beach once more.