A Cygnet in Spring

It’s early April; Spring seems late this year

to grace us with her presence once again,

to set about the bringing of her cheer,

yet following a week or so of rain

 

she comes in golden-green. The trumpets sound

and all round Upper Lake her flags fly high –

the birch, the lime, the London plane, all crowned

and fluttering beneath a cloudless sky.

 

Beside the lake, a cygnet stands, quite still

apart from grooming movements, beak to flank,

a careful combing through each whitening quill,

his feet well planted on the earthen bank.

 

The native cygnets left the lake in March,

chased off by both their parents. Best begone!,

the cob’s wings signalled, raised in angry arch,

the violence of the season for the swan.

 

The pair is nesting now, by Lower Lake;

this cygnet isn’t threatened at this spot.

A flock of pigeons struts, a mallard drake

swims past, pursues his aims. The sun is hot

 

yet comfortable today. The water gleams,

the cygnet rests his head a little while

in fleeting sleep. I wonder if he dreams;

his silver beak curves slightly in a smile.

​

- - -

Published in Pulsebeat, May 2025

​

- - -​

I wrote this poem in mid-April 2025, following an outing to Pittville Park. Two months earlier, I’d been injured during a medical centre visit. The resulting pain in my right knee had meant I hadn’t been able to do much for a while, so I was happy to be able to visit the park again.

​

The photo above was the cover image for the May 2025 issue of Well Met; I love the reflections of the golden-green foliage in the water. The cygnet had most likely flown into the area with the instinct of meeting a female of breeding age and setting up a territory for them and their offspring. His own father will have seen him off from the lake where he was born.

​

Sadly for the cygnet, there was no female to find here, and about a week after I’d written the poem I learned that George and Maisie had come across him and chased him away. But at least he had a few days of relaxing by the water, before resuming his searches.

- - -

Next: Two Cheese Rolling Poems