by Andrew Collinson
Trickles and drips from limestone lips
ichor, earthy wounds gentle issue
mossy Ribblehead springs and gills
Cam and Gayle beck’s confluence fresh and free
Piped by meadow pipit calls, Belisima Ribble
wends down - to suckle the Irish sea
Three peaks and Roman road near
crows-foot veins nourish flow. Jam, Syke, Shivery
Long, Lat and Mares Gill’s all make young
jugular Belisima grow. Dipper, plover
and stonechat love her, in punctuated
rapid’s steady melisma billow
Stumbling as tot over gritstone rock, a tyke finds her feet
more Yorkshire waters strive and meet
sheep-washing a dammed job for the youngster
She can be harsh and freeze and riffle in breeze
where Swale’s on their knee’s drink her
grey wagtail’s bob yellow, chit and thrive
Milled, wheeled and Pudsey leaped, energetic teen waters put to work
through Settle Gisburn Denham and Bolland, forded bridged and hipp-stoned
Past Fooden’s otter cave the rarely captive teenager slips through landscape
waters downhill escape, quietly moving, an occasional burble or
whispered swirl, a gently moving quiet girl
Her stony hips camouflage redshank and teetering sand piper
near kingfisher and martin’s holy banks. Shy, deceptively strong
naturally covert moving along -she’s smitten. The wild Hodder
industrial Calder and Belisima all wed near Mitton. Unquestioned
she rides Sale Wheel overt before Ribchester’s Roman ford
winding deep as cormorant’s fish, she’s wider, mature and lish
Belisima Ribble quietly broods with certain moods
she can giggle and laugh along the path and boil
in swollen rage. She will dance in fun, potter and run from
mountain issue to old age, coloured brackish
or clear, when the heavens come down she’ll turn
builder tea brown, flooding fascinating fear
The tide rips up a bore as curlew, oyster catcher and snipe probe mud
Thousand’s feed breed and nest round muddy reed
geese - red legged and brent witness Belisima Ribble’s
marshy manifold un-robe, Southport to St Annes
exhausted and spent, she lopes away - to suckle the Irish sea.
Trickles and drips from limestone lips
ichor, earthy wounds gentle issue
mossy Ribblehead springs and gills
Cam and Gayle beck’s confluence fresh and free
Piped by meadow pipit calls, Belisima Ribble
wends down - to suckle the Irish sea
Three peaks and Roman road near
crows-foot veins nourish flow. Jam, Syke, Shivery
Long, Lat and Mares Gill’s all make young
jugular Belisima grow. Dipper, plover
and stonechat love her, in punctuated
rapid’s steady melisma billow
Stumbling as tot over gritstone rock, a tyke finds her feet
more Yorkshire waters strive and meet
sheep-washing a dammed job for the youngster
She can be harsh and freeze and riffle in breeze
where Swale’s on their knee’s drink her
grey wagtail’s bob yellow, chit and thrive
Milled, wheeled and Pudsey leaped, energetic teen waters put to work
through Settle Gisburn Denham and Bolland, forded bridged and hipp-stoned
Past Fooden’s otter cave the rarely captive teenager slips through landscape
waters downhill escape, quietly moving, an occasional burble or
whispered swirl, a gently moving quiet girl
Her stony hips camouflage redshank and teetering sand piper
near kingfisher and martin’s holy banks. Shy, deceptively strong
naturally covert moving along -she’s smitten. The wild Hodder
industrial Calder and Belisima all wed near Mitton. Unquestioned
she rides Sale Wheel overt before Ribchester’s Roman ford
winding deep as cormorant’s fish, she’s wider, mature and lish
Belisima Ribble quietly broods with certain moods
she can giggle and laugh along the path and boil
in swollen rage. She will dance in fun, potter and run from
mountain issue to old age, coloured brackish
or clear, when the heavens come down she’ll turn
builder tea brown, flooding fascinating fear
The tide rips up a bore as curlew, oyster catcher and snipe probe mud
Thousand’s feed breed and nest round muddy reed
geese - red legged and brent witness Belisima Ribble’s
marshy manifold un-robe, Southport to St Annes
exhausted and spent, she lopes away - to suckle the Irish sea.
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