'Spanish Waters'

As a small boy at prep school in England I was particularly struck on first reading John Masefield's 'Spanish Waters'. I came to like his other poems too, 'Sea Fever' and 'Cargoes' amongst them, but 'Spanish Waters' took me back to the place where '....I would that I could be', my home in Mombasa or, more precisely, one of its sandy beaches.

So when I read the first verse of the poem....

Spanish waters, Spanish waters, you are ringing in my ears,
Like a slow sweet piece of music from the grey forgotten years;
Telling tales, and beating tunes, and bringing weary thoughts to me
Of the sandy beach at Muertos, where I would that I could be.

....I changed it a bit....

Afric's waters, Afric's waters, you are ringing in my ears,
Like a slow sweet piece of music from the grey forgotten years;
Telling tales, and beating tunes, and bringing weary thoughts to me
Of the sandy beach at Mvita, where I would that I could be.

....Kisiwa Cha Mvita - the Island of War - being the old, Swahili name for Mombasa.

I liked the way Masefield conjured a yearning for the sea, for the touch of the wind, and for the beaches he had known. It was as if he, like me, was an exile, someone who had experienced places that many others hadn't, and remembered them vividly.

I'd be glad to step ashore there. Glad to take a pick and go
To the lone blazed coco-palm tree in the place no others know,
And lift the gold and silver that has mouldered there for years
By the loud surf of Los Muertos which is beating in my ears.

I did see my beaches again. I went back to my Muertos and dug up my gold but I kept leaving it again, kept moving, always in the hope of finding something richer until, one day, what happened to Masefield's old pirate happened to me - he would be 'glad to step ashore there' but he knew he never would.

Photo of Nyali Beach courtesy Tony Chetham.