Point Lonsdale Poem by Rory Hudson

There’s rain in the distance,
scraping across the canvas of the sky
at the horizon where the sun is painting
its final glow on the evening that dies at last.
You see it from the darkening beach,
sand soft beneath your feet, till washed by tides
sweeping in succession that numbs the mind,
serried ranks of soldiers of a restless sea
sent to their deaths, sinking out of sight,
blurred like the memories of ages past
written in the rocks where oceans meet -
and you can hear their clash that is forever,
in the distance, above the sadder murmur of the tides,
mocked only by the cries of circling gulls,
raucous to your ear, that would gladly find
a gentler music with which to welcome night.

And all is grey now, all is lost,
all is blurred as time and tide seep through
the sandy foundations of your unknown life;
and from the west where the sun’s last fire has set
the rain sweeps down at last to the shore on which you stand alone.