The Flat Rock Light 1997.

Watson, Patrick

The Flat Rock Light 1997

   Out in the Sound the bell-buoy, flat, insists.
   Clang when you sleep, clang when you wake.

   This day, you woke to spoken words,
   Spoken and written, too: "LISTEN! Fenton!"

   But when you found the early version printed
   On a board, it said, not "LISTEN! Fenton!"
   But, mildly, just "Cher Fenton," nothing urgent,
   Nothing to command the eye.

   The landscape through the six-paned window was the same:
   The tufts of grass, the rock, the drying nets,
   MacLaren's skiff upturned, haze on the sea --
   So why the sudden urgence now?
   Why "LISTEN! Fenton!"? Why
   The exclamation marks?

   Peering through the six panes once again
   (The prisms of this dream), you seek a clue
   Among the tufts, the sea, the upturned skiff,
   The shrouded form of Flat Rock Light,
   Out in the Sound.

   And there it is. You knew before you saw it.
   Of course. Down in the corner of the frame.
   A dark and shapeless form, not there before,
   Has started its slow growth towards your house.

   Not dark, so much,
   As simply ... without light.

   It will, on its present track
   Of lava-shelving vectors,
   Insist and swell, flatten the tufts,
   Press on the panes, blot out the rock,
   Obscure the nets, eclipse the skiff,
   And then at last erase the faint and distant double flash
   Of Flat Rock Light, and the flat-tongued heartbeat clang
   Of that relentless bell.

Patrick Watson began his broadcasting career in 1943. As creative director of the Historica Foundation, he developed The Heritage Minutes. He has published 14 books, including four novels. His newest book is a series of sketches of history and historical figures, in comic verse, entitled Finn's Thin Book of Irish Ironies, illustrated by Aislin and published on St. Patrick's Day 2010 by McArthur and Company. He is currently reading poems by Morris Bishop, from Spilt Milk and other sources, and rereading both Finnegans Wake and Ulysses by James Joyce.