Beethoven's Father Poem by Michael Buhagiar

Towers, turrets, high walls all made
Of sand gold-gleaming in noonday rays…
He would send his son with bucket and spade
To build and build under stringent gaze.

He worshipped him who had built the first,
Yet could not help staring, against his will,
At the hard waves slaking the castles’ thirst
As twilight fell; and it tortured him still.

One storm-lashed night of pounding foam
He stripped and ran to catch a wave
Which snapped his pretzel spine with ease.

Now the boy all day remains at home,
And wields a delving pen to brave
The pulse and roar of night-coped seas.