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  • Horse-bathing Parade
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Horse-bathing Parade

William Kersley Holmes

A few clouds float across the grand blue sky,
The glorious sun has mounted zenith-high,
Mile upon mile of sand, flat, golden, clean,
And bright, stretch north and south, and fringed with green,
The rough dunes fitly close the landward view.
All else is sea; somewhere in misty blue
The distant coast seems melting into air —
Earth, sky, and ocean, all commingling there —
And one bold, lonely rock, whose guardian light
Glistens afar by day, a spire snow white.
Here, where the ceaseless blue-green rollers dash
Their symmetry to dazzling foam and flash,
We ride our horses, silken flanks ashine,
Spattered and soaked with flying drops of brine,
The sunny water tosses round their knees,
Their smooth tails shimmer in the singing breeze.
White streaks of foam sway round us, to and fro,
With shadows swaying on the sand below;
The horses snort and start to see the foam,
And hear the breaking roar of waves that come,
Or, pawing, splash the brine, and so we stand,
And hear the surf rush hissing up the sand.


William Kersley Holmes

from More ballads of field and billet, and other verses (Paisley : Alexander Gardner, 1915)

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horses riding seashore
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William Kersley Holmes1882 - 1966

William Kersley Holmes was a poet, journalist, editor and enthusiastic hillwalker whose poems of the First World War, both jaunty and down to earth, brought pleasure to his fellow soldiers and comfort to those left at home.
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