NaPoWriMo #12: Severn Blues

Today's poem is inspired by NaPoWriMo's daily prompt, which asked for a poem with a lot of alliteration and assonance. I have to say, having read this back, this poem contains a lot more of the former than it does of the latter.

Severn Blues

A river emerges from the lowlands,
swallowing another as it swirls
its way to the sea
in a sumptuous symphony.

Bridges that bind the roads
in a bilateral bond
brace themselves against the barrage
of the brutal channel wind.

Across the flow of the rolling Severn,
a lammergeyer flies higher than gulls
inland across grass fires to a new roost
somewhere on a drier mountainside.

Lammergeyer

Over mountains, glaciers and rivers,
a lammergeyer soars,
surveying the white mountains
with red-rimmed eyes.
It flies as a great winged spectre
to the cold wastes of the west.

The carcass of a blue sheep,
revealed by the retreat of the snow,
surrounded by crows
and griffon vultures.

Squabbling,
the griffons of the Himalayas
flay the sheep into a red blotch
on the mountainside.
Ripping away at sinew and muscle
until they reach the bones.

The spectre descends,
and the griffins scatter
as it lands in the grass.
It ruffles grey and white feathers,
lifts bones in its talons,
carries them above the slopes
and drops them onto the cold rocks.
The bones broken, the lammergeyer
feasts on luxurious marrow.