Sunday, 10 October 2021

People’s Bay

 

People’s Bay



A series of poems inspired by small harbours and bays. Chosen for events happening. There is the tsunami, the monster coming ashore, the wartime spies landing, the warplane raised from the water, the risk of drowning and much more. Stories told in the form of poems.


People’s Bay

 

Tsunami

People were swimming and diving having fun in the shallows

The tidal wave came in at supersonic speed and hit

Rising up like a behemoth to pound and steal the people

They never had a chance to swim away or reach the shore

 

The Thai island took a hit and everything changed

Such a pretty quiet bay to chill out and think nothing

Enjoy the lap of the waves and watch the strong high noon sun

There are shoals of multi coloured fish in the shallows

 

And low flying gulls that intelligently fish on the wing

You can snorkel and spy the delicate rainbow coral

The locals will serve you a fruit kebab and a cold beer

You must take some photos to remember this place

 

A little island with an even smaller secluded bay

Time has no meaning here except when the wave came

Tens of thousands died or were hurt or simply missing

A dozen nationalities died that day many here

 

The island was ruined hit by the wave no mercy

Humans were just more flotsam and jetsam pounded

Oblivion hit that day sea life also suffered grieved

Beached dolphins and sharks and scoured coral

 

Snapped matchstick palm trees and stranded boats

Uninjured tourists turned rescuers saving a score

Those who survived were lucky the day wave came

The wave devastated countless nations and lands

 

A quarter of a million died that day in 2004

Many at a small bay on a small Thai island

Where there was a before and after

 

 

 

Spies Landing

The little harbour by the town was a cloak and dagger place

Varied spies were landed here by opposing sides

Each wanted to be the master of the town and island

Sark was smaller than the bigger islands but was as important

A British sub came into the harbour and surfaced

It dropped off a lady spy to seduce Nazi officers

To get their secrets on troop numbers and orders

What the garrison’s aims were and sow dis-information

At the end if she survived she was to kill the commander

An Allied war victory ending the war 6 months early

Were the Nazi’s aware of this plan before it happened?

Would they capture either the sub or the girl or just observe

Then pounce and torture her for the Allied war secrets

It was different when German U-boats surfaced here

They always went closer to the shore and were quicker

Dropping off their agents and diving in less than a minute

The Nazi spies would infiltrate the Resistance movement

Finding the key members and liquidating them and their line

Often they placed a stool pigeon to inform and pass on lies

This was the way it went in the Channel Islands in the war

Guernsey and Jersey overshadowed the smaller island

Its little sheltered bay was perfect for spy drops

Decades later few know the secret of cat and mouse

And the cloak and dagger war that went on here

 

 

 

Monster’s Come Ashore

It swayed from side to side and roared like a Devil

A monster came ashore from the deeper water

The inhabitants of the American port ran away

 

Trying to get away to live another day

 

In-between roars the monster laughed like a hyena

It was sky blue in colour and thirty feet long

Half slithering and half walking on three legs

A bizarre animal risen up from the deep

From where no sunlight shines or human goes

 

Yet it fancied human flesh so ventured forth

 

A very hungry gruesome form of snapdragon

Older than the dinosaurs and twice as mean

T-Rex had nothing on this monster in looks

Or speed for this thing killed and ate on the fly

Snatching random people and liquefying them

His mouth was his belly and his eating tool

 

Sailors and fishermen were caught and eaten

 

A cop tried to shoot the creature but failed

His bullets bounced off and he was taken alive

All those under its grasp were hideously killed

The harbour town was soon a ghost town

The surreal monster from the water owned the bay

The new master of the world was here to stay

 

It wouldn’t stop till all were dead and consumed

 

 

 

Hidden Loot

The Philippine bay was home to a family of fishermen

One was diving down to retrieve his lead weights

He dropped them when fixing his nets and had to get them

He found more than lead while down there

There was a box of gold bars winking at him

Sat there on the seabed in an open ammo box

Had Yamashita and the OSS left it here?

Dozens of metres down on the bottom

A real treasure beyond dispute over there

Just like Simoun’s discarded jewel case

Which is worth the most the gold or his jewels?

Both are one offs and beyond cash value

Best leave the gold here for bad men want it

And a quite a few jealous women too

Gold corrupts ruins lives kills maims and war

Nothing good would come of it except what if

This gold could correctly fix the broken economy

Paved roads streetlights flushable toilets fresh water

Plus a dozen other things to improve our lives

Not the shootings robberies murders stabbings

If this gold was brought to the surface to the world

The fisherman is smart and retrieves his weights

He leaves the gold to the next fool with stupid dreams 

 

 

 

Raise Warbird

The old woman was on her death bed

Her home was a small cottage up on the rocks

The view overlooked a small bay east of Tokyo

She told a story for the first time after 85 years

In the water is an aeroplane at the deepest part

It contains my sweetheart he flew over in the war

They were up chasing the Americanos their B-sans

He was hit and flew over to see me but crashed there

 

Raise the plane and bring my love up from his watery grave

He said he would see me before my end in this world

My end is close now so please honour my last wish

We were together the night before they flew off

I know it was him the plane carried my name

I saw it and him before he landed on the water

 

They launched boats to save him but couldn’t

His plane floated but he was gone elsewhere

He simply wasn’t there in the cockpit or water

I saw all this from the shoreline it’s not far

You can swim there in minutes where he is

 

Please bring up his plane and my love

I know he’ll be still there inside his plane

A week later we lifted up the plane

It was in thirty metres of water in the bay

It was the deepest part before the ocean

 

The boat crane brought it to the harbour jetty

It was carefully placed on wooden pallets

Fresh water hoses hosed it down of salt and silt

It was a green Nakajima Ki-84 Hayate

Nothing was missing from the old plane

With a bit of work it would fly again

But it was a sacred war grave of a pilot

 

The old woman slowly walked to the plane

Her name was still visible clear as day!

She was helped onto the barnacle full wing

We slowly slid the canopy back on its rails

There in the pilot’s seat was the pilot!

His sweetheart smiled and nodded

She reached out and patted his skull

 

‘I knew you were here waiting for me’

Her lover smiled ‘Finally we are as one’

They clasped hands almost a prayer

The 96 year old lady gently fell forward dead

Their huge circle was now complete

Our job was done they were now together

The Hayate would go to the museum

And we would find more old planes

 

 

 

Swept Away

The little children swam in the shallow water of the bay

For several days now and were part of the scenery

Then a wave came and bounded off the rocks

Out to see the kids were swept into the Baltic

For their parents their world came to an end

The family holiday went from being tranquil

It was now serious wrong nightmare Oh Fuck!!!

Our kids are dead we let them swim in the water

The sloping sand was so inviting to the water

That warm lovely clear salt water under the sun

Sparkles of sun danced on the surface alive

Not dead like our two kids Emily and Johann

Age 3 and 5 now dead in Heaven with God!

Why oh why oh why on and on and on

As parents we deserve to die don’t we?

We took our eyes off the children for minutes

As we did the other days and they were fine

Till a wave took them away forever more

Their little lifeless bodies on the sand

Oh Hellfire what have we done…

 

 

 

Mermaid’s Shenanigans

Look there’s a real mermaid right there before us!

See how she swims oh she’s waving to us

This was no trick of the evening light

This Peruvian town had seen nothing like this

Was she here to stop the war?

 

I got my phone and filmed the mermaid

She was swimming and cavorting in the shallows

I notice how pretty she is with long black hair

Her skin looks almost green in the light

And her mystical eyes shine from within

She waves and beckons me to join her

What do I do?

 

Other people look at me and say no don’t go

I hand a guy my jacket and phone and shoes

I keep my shorts and t-shirt on and go to her

I walk into the water and it’s warm

She smiles and holds out a hand

 

I shake it and say my name is Lopez

She’s Tiana and a mermaid

I nod in agreement and we swim

She takes my hand and leads me along the shore

Many people point and speak and film us

You could say we are famous just now

 

We stop and embrace one another

Her kiss is like the early morning sun

The wind blows her hair like a cloud

Oh how I love this unreal creature!

We swim some more and loop and dive

More kisses and we make love off shore

 

How we did this is our secret even if filmed

I found my partner I’d been searching for

This small secluded bay brought her to me

I joined her in the deeper water

No longer alone or hated

 

 

 

Liselle Swims

Greek goddess Liselle swam in the little harbour

Time out from hiking the Cretan mountains

And researching the war history and Knossos

Those topics were so relevant yet so yesterday

She needed to reconnect with her inner being

This was the way to do it all by solo herself

She didn’t need a companion to guide her

History had no place on this swim

When the wave came she was lifted

A feather up above as below left right

No direction just movement all ways

Even still still still midnight dream cliché

Ended her thoughtfulness within her head

The law of physics objects in motion came

For a time Liselle was almost supersonic

That big wave moved so fast it was dizzying

She could breathe due to the air pocked

Ground effect science what gulls used

The wave rose up and rapidly slowed

She felt the deceleration passed out

Never asleep for this was real again

Another huge wave Thera style

When Knossos and the Minoans were hit

Who would get it this time?

Liselle rode the wrecking wave

Farms town cities Crete was swamped

A cost was asked a debt paid

Observed by a girl

 

 

 

Stolen Water

We were sailing in lazy circles in our boat

The water shook from the seabed and bang!

It happened the big push of the quake

Water eddied and swirled and our boat spun about

Rocks suddenly appeared out of the water

The water raced backwards and we were on land!

This was all so very scary I didn’t want to die just now

I wanted us to sail all the way to Greece next week

We were now on dry land that was really the seabed

The water was quite distant and islands were now hills

This was crazy and I was having none of it

I told my friend leave the boat we’ve got to go

What was the real beach and shore was safety

There were two floor bars and houses there

We ran two hundred yards to the beach

It was surreal we passed coral and seaweed

And even an old shipwreck from the war

This was stupid how could this happen?

We almost fell over when a new quake came

The land rocked and rolled and we saw it move

A sick side to side up and down shake

We were staggering now while it quaked

Then it stopped and we ran again up the beach

It was fifty yards to the Oyster Bar

We entered said Hi grabbed a free Efes beer

And went to the top floor to safety from any wave

There we saw the sea slowly enter the bay

But it stopped way beyond our boat

We didn’t know why till my pal pointed

The entire ocean floor had risen up!

The old beach was now a small hill

It raised the seabed the water was gone!

Damn I wanted a new beer and kebab

Then we better retrieve our boat

 

 

 

Sub Sea Ship

The spaceship was hidden in the bay under the sloping cliffs

A girl called Elma found it while walking up atop the cliff

There was no path up there just wild grass and small trees

It was obvious nobody had ever been there it was untouched

This made it hard going for the solo hiker on her gap year

She sat on a rock and drank some cold coffee for a rest

It was while gazing down at the water she saw something

This wasn’t a low seagull or sun reflection or a small boat

There was a thing under the water shining but not a reflection

It was under the water maybe on the bottom or floating there

It must be a submarine researching the geology or old wreck

Here the cliff was a hundred metres tall with no way down

The girl was smart and studied her homemade map

And noted a series of small ledges half a mile back

She headed here and went down to the water level

A little beach allowed some access along before it ended

Then she left her pack and got changed into a diving gear

She had a wetsuit flippers mask and air tank and camera

Then swam round the headland to the area she overlooked

Using her snorkel to save oxygen till she dove down

The girl took a GPS reading on her watch and went under

The water was deep clear and full of coloured fish

Far below her was an object that could be a submarine

It had no lights or propeller and didn’t move

It was just above the sandy bottom acting like a rock

Carefully she filmed it while swimming round it

A dozen metres across oblong shaped with no windows

It was an advanced sub or alien flying machine at rest

The lady diver surveyed it and studied it for research

Just then a door opened up and pink light glowed

Inquisitively she swam over and entered the craft

The door closed and the craft rose to the surface

Water flowed off it as it silently climbed to the sky

Taking the Russian diver girl to Goddess knew where

 


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