Wildlife on the Marne

Wildlife on the Marne

Along the fringes of the wide ribbon of the Marne

Frayed by clusters of human detritus

Nature  adapts.

Moor hens build their nest from paper scraps

On a floating log and the attentive male

Scavenges among the mess for titbits,

Sculling back to his patient mate

To drop them into her waiting beak

And glide away again as water rats

Make their rapid way towards their holes

Hidden from view in the river bank.

A cormorant perches, alert, on a wire

Stretched across the river

Then dives for silver gleaming fish

Among the frothy rapids of a weir,

Keeping his own against the current

To dive and dive again

In competition with the Sunday fishers

And their sophisticated double rods

That angle empty over the water.

Water birds doze dappled in the sun

All along the path,

Oblivious of strollers

Or preen, twisting their snaking heads

Along their backs:

Mallard males with emerald heads

And streaks of peacock blue or bright mauve

Enriching the brown of their wings;

White swans, one with its sleepy head

Tucked into its back, the other busy

With its orange beak under an outstretched wing.

We look for the pair of  swamp beavers and their young

But they are not available today

Pursuing their lives

Heedless of us.

Written 14 June 2010 after a walk the previous day along the Marne at St Maur