Poet's Walk

Hosted by Cecily and MamaGeek

Let me take you to a favourite place, where Harry and I have walked many times, in many different kinds of weather. It is one of our favourite walks.

Clevedon in Somerset where the sea is a brownish colour, not because it is dirty but because of the mud in the Bristol Channel. At high tide the water reaches 8.9 metres or more and the tides are treacherous. There is no sand on the accessible beaches but lots of pebbles, stones and rocks.

There is a lovely coastal walk known as Poet's Walk, so called because of the links with various poets of the past. 

On occasions while walking in this place, we have seen sparrow hawks hovering motionless stalking their prey.

This is the path that leads to the scene in the first picture.

There is a little church on the left hand side that cannot be seen from this photo and in the cemetery are some very old gravestones.

Several poets came to Clevedon in the past. Coleridge stayed here in 1795 and Arthur Hallam was buried here in 1834. Hallam was Lord Tennyson's dearest friend and he wrote a poem for him, that I have written out below. Although Tennyson could not bear to visit his friend's grave for a long time, he did call while on his honeymoon in the year 1850, for a fleeting visit.

You can see the coast line of Wales on the horizon.

Break, break, break 

On thy cold grey stones O sea!

And I would thy my tongue could utter

The thoughts that arise in me.

O well for the fisherman's boy,

That he sings to his sister in play!

O well for the sailor lad,

That he sings in his boat on the bay.

And the stately ships go on 

To their haven under the hill;

But O for the touch of the vanished hand,

And the sound of a voice that is still!

Break, break, break 

At the foot of thy crags, O sea!

But the tender grace of a day that is dead

Will never come back to me.

Alfred Lord Tennyson

Photostory Friday is hosted by Cicely and MamaGeek. Do pay them a visit.