Return of the Species, by Oona Chantrell

Return of the Species

They started as a trickle

then a stream

a tidal wave turning from the sea

Lumpsucker, Mitten Crab, Common Salt Snail

all the scale and skin creatures inching home again

Roach, Rockling, Herring Sprat

swimming up the Estuary to see the London lights

Sea Reach to Deptford Creek

swelling by the mile

Greenwich Reach is nile-blue under blue sky.

Bottom feeders start to feel the warmth on their backs

green-eye Tench, silver Eel, muddy little Dabs

and deep asleep once more in Bugsby`s Hole

a single queen Salmon quivering her tail.

Greedy gulls come flocking too

for the evening fry

Yellow-legged and Black-backed and cruel

Arctic Skua, sickle wings slicing up sky

like City spivs high

in Canary Wharf Tower

spinning, wheeling, dealing.

Yet all the passing species -

men, birds, fishes

leave no lasting memory in water.

Sweet river, Father Thames

ever old, ever new

wipes away the traces

of them, of me, of you.


Oona Chantrell, October 2008