Seagulls
“ It’s okay; all will be well, be patient. It is this quiet evening hour. ”
Liverpool Waterfront
These digital art frames capture that individual moment that we all experience
The Garden Room in this Quiet Evening Hour
Seagulls
It is good to hear the Seagulls,
The tide is on the turn,
The storm has briefly passed,
Hailstones!
And on the horizon...
Most surely,
More to come.
No Wind though.
But the Bite is in the Air!
Four-point-five Celsius to you,
Thirty-nine degrees Fahrenheit to me.
At Four-Past-the-Noonday-Sun,
Absent but on the Far Horizon,
The Sky, the Sea Merge and Swirl.
Great banks of cloud imprison a Blue Cavern
A Hint that Sun is not Absent yet,
Only concealed from view.
The Iron Men quickly recover.
Their timely Ascent from below the Waves,
A Seagull balances one foot
on a lifeless cranium,
Nature loves to mock the Human’s Mind
that it - the human brain - not Nature, has the Upper Hand!
Do not write for others.
Do not write for money.
Write only for personal pleasure.
Be content.
Keep an eye on reality.
Reality counters delusion.
Reality keeps perspective.
What I think is good will be pour to wiser minds.
Reality counters that inner arrogant thought
That ‘one’s work is good.’
“People will willingly part
with a ten pound note!”
Not so!
He or she who does is the fool.
Too often, poets’ nights and open mics
once home,
and eagerly opening the latest anthology
the eagerly spent ten pound note
now feels like a hundred pounds
bookies’ cert’ loser
Catching reality unawares
in the moment’s Hype
“Let secret pleasure be the engine of my pen
… Put down the pen
Rest the hand …”
Look out across the Estuary
The Mountains of Wales
from an English Coastline
Listen to the Seagulls.
The tide now fast recedes.
One leads the squadron
with noisy landing
venturing muddily onto
Rain-and-hail-drenched sand
detritus, jelly-fish, plastics
and the latest blight,
a discarded Covid facemask
And still it's 39 F
four point five to you.
June 2026
All Rights Reserved
Liverpool and Weston-Super-Mare
© 2016 Kenneth Thomas Webb
First written whilst walking Liverpool Crosby Beach 3.50 pm - 4.04 pm on a grey Saturday afternoon, 9 April 2016, it is by no means downbeat.
I realise, now, on pulling it out of the archive, that I was preparing myself for my mum’s departure six weeks later.
I’ve retained the portrait that heralded the original piece. I like its quiet reflection and gentleness, that hint of … … … … …
… … Contemplation
Ken Webb is a writer and proofreader. His website, kennwebb.com, showcases his work as a writer, blogger and podcaster, resting on his successive careers as a police officer, progressing to a junior lawyer in succession and trusts as a Fellow of the Institute of Legal Executives, a retired officer with the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve, and latterly, for three years, the owner and editor of two lifestyle magazines in Liverpool.
He also just handed over a successful two year chairmanship in Gloucestershire with Cheltenham Regency Probus.
Pandemic aside, he spends his time equally between his city, Liverpool, and the county of his birth, Gloucestershire.
In this fast-paced present age, proof-reading is essential. And this skill also occasionally leads to copy-editing writers’ manuscripts for submission to publishers and also student and post graduate dissertations.
