THE SEA WORD
By Emily Capon
My grandmother used to tell me, in a voice
That cracked, of rotting rusted bronze limbs sinking
Into the gritty darkness of silt at the bottom of the harbour.
There was a head attached, she said… it was a man,
With an expression downcast, a sneer of exalted position
Now furred with the algae and the age that hung upon
Each manufactured feature. Curled fingers gripped a staff that
Had fallen away, his claw still and flaking beneath a world
He used to own. On the plaque, these words appear:
‘One of the most virtuous and wise sons of their city’
But the veneration is vicious, my grandmother said, and its
Bronze pageantry wrapped the man in a shroud of glory laced
With blood, woven with hands wet with wounds that couldn’t heal.
The words of that colossal Wreck, she told me, will rust, splinter, and float away.
*****
By John Plowright
I met a traveller from a southwest port,
Who said – “You’ll find there now a pedestal
Where one who once stood tall is now cut short,
For though in life he never lacked the wherewithal,
He’s now a moral bankrupt in the dock of History’s court.
He hired the hands who weathered stormy waves
With faces set like flint and flintlock guns
They made each hold a hell for wretched slaves.
Yet those at home applauded his largesse.
Called him most virtuous and wise amongst its sons.
His gifts, indeed, it seemed made Bristol blessed.
But civic pride there’s now turned to disgust,
And past and present wrongs must be addressed
Before more reputations run to rust.”