At the River

By Dave Goulder


At the river you can smell this autumn afternoon.

Colours cloak the banks with trees, 

grasses, ferns and fading bracken strewn

around a brace of bright blobs–

one red, one yellow and each staring into the sky

at an object moving up, then sideways

dropping down to hover but not to fly. This drone

records the river scene below

and two hi-vis operators check pictures of violent water

running through split and channelled stone.



But the camera is oblivious

to the small dark swallow-shape

diving, circling in a series of near encounters

to identify a threat or victim; to regard, reject, escape.

Eventually the bird retires to woodland, weary of the
 chase;
but no – returning hurtling to hunt again

then rising for the final exit, flushing

a pair of pigeons from their arboreal resting place

while here two patient ravens stand

awaiting their own time to investigate

this odd intruder for themselves, but the drone is spent

and falls exhausted into waiting hands.


The last days of October now.

No swallows or martins here

but their shape is shared by something else;

something I’ve known in other years

and other scenes, sharp, sickle wings pursuing prey – 

a hunting merlin, and a drone

with two uninterested technophiles

have made my day.