Pele Tower

All the time, pervading, invading Pele View,
the yellow rape smells strongly of  bitter flowers.
The pollen drifts on windscreens
like a late spring snowdrift.

Pele Tower sits mutely,
it has no bell,
no voice, no alarm to say “I’m drowning”,
going under,
in this constantly moving mass of treacherous water.

The tower once a home to sheep.
Now an island,
adrift,
among and amidst a sea of citrus.
Intense colour saturation, cadmium hue light,
reflecting coldly on the warm sand-stone structure.

Swallows dive-bomb insects
just above the heads of zesty blooms.
And all the time in the background
the sound of water on rock.
The Scars at Cresswell resound day and night
to high winds smashing wave after wave
a dull roar
giving voice to the crop.

Subtle prismatic greys of the sea,
the changing greens of the forest,
the after image of acid lemon – to neon blue, bleeding over the edges
onto houses, trees, sky.
Colour polluting the eye and mind,
rendering all else, colourless and drab,
pushed back
as juicy neon pops forward.

Breaker crop,
breaking down the soil,
the balance of light and dark
is it all binary?

Sometimes it is
both  - and.
The yellow and the blue.
The swallows and the insects.
The sea and the rock.
The tower and the land.

The swallows are still chasing each other,
as I watch from the window at Pele View.
Skimming the rape,
wind moving sections of the blooms.
Perhaps potatoes would have been more useful?

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