Saint-Malo Rain
John Claiborne Isbell
The rain is hammering the grey slate roofs
that crowd Saint-Malo. And the packing-crates
of heaven, stacked above the quiet town,
are empty now. A listless gull or two
calls out the hours, here where the land and sea
so intermingle. I can almost tell
when high tide will be coming. Every mast
is lifting into air, and every keel
is breaking from the seabed where the ooze
has held it fast. The children at their play
have stooped and squatted where the equal rain
now slants upon the harbor as the tide
creeps inward. It is not a mystery,
it brings the sea like honey every day.
Such were my thoughts as the grey evening fell.
- - -
Fliss: Greetings, John, and welcome back to Well Met! Many thanks for returning to this, our 17th issue. Come September, we’ll be one-and-a-half!
Word-Bird: Woo-hoo!
John: Greetings, Fliss and Word-Bird, and well met indeed! Woo-hoo! That is a birthday to celebrate!
F: Very much so! Perhaps we’ll have one-and-a-half cakes. In the meantime, here we are in Saint Malo. Was the poem inspired by a recent trip, John?
J: It was indeed; Rita and I were in Saint Malo last week. One-and-a-half cakes sounds splendid! I look forward to it!
F: As do we! Where is Saint Malo, John? And is it usually rainy there?
J: Two excellent questions! It is on Brittany‘s north coast. As to rain, I spent a teenage summer in Brittany and it rained daily. It rains less now what with global warming, but still more than elsewhere in France.
W.-B.: I miss rain.
F: I know, W.-B. We haven’t had much here for a while, have we? But let’s hope that’ll change later in the year. Unfortunately it seems global warming has rather set in nowadays, resulting in those higher temperatures over the summer months. It has been very hot where you usually live in France, hasn’t it, John?
J: It has indeed! I would say it has got above 100 degrees, but since that is the boiling point of water in Celsius, I will just say we got over 43. Pretty hot!
W.-B.: Hot… and horrid!
F: W.-B. seems quite cross about the heat, which is understandable. Let’s enter the poem! It’s always good to see gulls, even though we have just two here and they’re described as listless. It’s also pleasant to contemplate the tide. Is there any correlation between gull calls and the coming of high tide, John, or did you discern the coming of high tides mainly by the way the ships were moving?
J: Now that is a fascinating question. I wonder whether there is indeed any correlation! No, for me, I just had an idea when low tide had been and extrapolated. Like Cornwall, Brittany has impressive tides. Gulls, it seems to me, are sometimes listless, sometimes very active, as here.
F: Yes, the wonders of bird behaviour! We also like the ooze amidst all the ships’ movements. Were there many children on the beach that day?
J: No, not too many, but they were moving about among the beached boats, if not careened ones. It was quite picturesque!
F: It sounds delightful, John. Now, let’s consider the metrical matters! You have pent here, we believe?
J: Yes indeed! A bagel and a glass of chardonnay.
W.-B.: Are these rewards? The words are tasty. Yay!
J: They make a fine reward and are indeed quite tasty! They also serve as a mnemonic for pent.
W.-B.: We thought as much, hence our response in pent! / Now let us to the shore and pitch a tent.
J: Aha! I see your words are heaven-sent. / And after all, to feast is what I meant. / Perhaps this will become a precedent? / Though all our words are not our own; they’re lent.
W.-B.: Very much so!
F: Yes, well done John and W.-B. What a delightful duet! Well, that seems a cheerful way to end this month’s discussion. How’s about a little Breton music now, as we leave Saint Malo?
J: Yes indeed! I shall propose Manau‘s La Tribu de Dana.
W.-B.: Excellents!
- - -
John Claiborne Isbell is a writer and now-retired professor currently residing in France with his wife Margarita. Their son Aibek lives in California with his wife Stephanie. John’s first book of poetry was Allegro (2018); he also publishes literary criticism, for instance An Outline of Romanticism in the West (2022) and Women Writers in the Romantic Age (April 2025), both available free online. John spent 35 years playing Ultimate Frisbee and finds it difficult not to dive for catches any more!
- - -
Hop to…
David E. | David S. | Don | Ethan | Gail | Janet | Janice | Mark | Melissa | Mike | Paul | Steven | Susan | Word-Bird