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Teignmouth, Devon
Autumn in Mules Park
Poem by John Coutts (John was a Teignmouth Resident and worked in the park as a volunteer)
Riding on the waves of the western wind from the jaws of a hurricane.
Her aftershock hit the Parson and the Clerk with bullets of driving rain.
And the apples in the orchard were torn to the ground and the trees were bent by the storm
More leaves on the ground than there were in the trees more branches on the lawn.
She came to this place with her colours flying and her eyes were frozen bright.
They mirrored the flashing of the dahlias clashing in nasturtiums of morning light.
Between Mules park and the promenade in the din of the pounding waves
She circled and turned; she battered and burned in the colours of the dying day.
At last from the bank in the Orchard she spoke of the beauty of the great 'I Ching'*
How the end of this beautiful summer must come to turn into a dying thing.
She was speaking in tongues but the sound was broken by the rasp of her final breath
And she called for the flowers in the spring to bloom bright from this kiss of death.
* 'I Ching' https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Ching "The Book of Changes"