CLIVE WILLIAMS

An interpretation in paint and verse of a day painting at Littlehampton, September 2010

Above a Sussex Beach by Clive Williams
dedicated to David Mitchell a fellow artist

when early morning's moonstone light seeks to wake
be still - lie perfectly still
do not move your hand or folded arm from near your face
conceal your waking breath with a softer pace
then look upon my stolen hoard
for I am a thief a thief of time
and will show you the art of how it is done

here is the time a crown of gulls wheel halos in the heavens
and scribe our fate on warm river air
the arun runs fingers through clean picked ribs of long dead hulks
slips sideways over silken beds of chocolate mud
and chuckles chasing coat tails of the fast ebbing tide

but only you will feel the instant when trees cease to whisper
and the world stands still and you sense that you are falling
only then will you know that the time to steal has come
and a maiden fair with rhineland hair
brings octopus and wine

look here now
while the wind sweeps the slipper limpet foreshore
where pebbles lie like plovers eggs and scrunch up to the dunes
our footprints in the boardwalk sand live then in a breath are gone
and the sea holly rattles
when the wind surfs the seed heads on the long dune grass

and the maiden from the rhine
brings us chanterelles and mussel shells

a beaten silver sliver of a spring tide moon
watched me steal as we walked that afternoon
the seasons shall not age the moments I have stolen
though our footprints sift through the slats of time
and the lizard's tracks and the yellow horned poppies
all blow to dust all too soon
 

velvet is the evening when she walks in sculpted chambers
her eyes haze olive green as sacred roman glass
she brings us marjoram and tarragon
and again I sense the falling
and her hair hangs down in golden saxon plaits

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