Poem Of The Week - It Is Time To Return To The source

 THE RIVER SEVERN POEMS

A series of poems commissioned by BBC Radio 4 in the voice of the River Severn, voiced by Jane Lapotaire for three plays called - Plays Of The Severn, including - A magnificent Prospect Of The Works by Peter, Roberts, Just Another Tunnel by Christopher Denys, and A Little Bit o' Bacon Fat by Martyn Read in December 2000. 

The plays charted the course of Britain's longest river through history and landscape; the voice of the river ran through each play.  The poems were also added to with a journey I later undertook to trace the course of the river from its source to the sea.  So this poem, It Is Time To Return To the Source wasn’t written for any of the plays, but was my personal reflection on walking the length of the Severn, understanding the purpose of a river; and I suppose it could also be seen as a metaphor for how seemingly small insignificant moments in our lives can also be important, and touch others without us even realising it as we all walk inevitably to our journey’s end.

IT IS TIME TO RETURN TO THE SOURCE

It is time to return to the source of the river

To go back to the beginning

Where muddy water bubbles up

through the soggy earth

And trickles its way over stones

worn smooth with the sculptor's soft caress

It is time to trace my way back

To find the meaning of a river

And see how a tiny cut

Bleeds a puddle into a stream,

into a river, into a sea

Here is a journey of patience

The earth has opened a tiny vein

To feed an artery

To fill the heart of an estuary

And breathe life along its way

And I can feel time

calling me back to the source

To see how simple things

can become grand and important

To see how a muddy puddle

can become an ocean

and make a whole planet live.