Just across the Channel on the edge of the Garden Isle,
close to the Hampshire shore, lie The Needles.
Well, one needle lies for certain, and truth be told,
the rest of the lot are are still standing.
A night-light was erected above Scratchell's Bay,
possibly named after the second or third Earl of Scratchell,
replaying the pillar gravity had sent storming off its chalky perch
and into the Solent.
I was told the noise was considerable, and although a nuisance,
no fines were issued by municipal officials.
The dust took a over a fortnight to settle over Lymington,
where villagers, not understanding Wight from right, opened their mouths in awe, and to catch the bitter-tasting snowflakes on their native tongues.
Oh, there are still needles remaining—three of them, certainly fewer than four.
I can only name two: Needle 1 and Needle 2.
They stand there still, their tips at the tip of the island nearest the Dorset coast, yes the one that many Lymingtonians still think is France,
particularly the ones who take the ferry.
No one else remembers the fourth, which was named Lot's Wife—
or after her, Lot's Wife, that is.
I remember no better than anyone else who Lot's wife was before she got married. Lot's Betrothed, I suppose.
I purchased a coloured map from a bibliopole in Lymington that had Lot's Wife still on it, which seemed rather unusual for a bibliopole.
Their shop windows do not, as a rule, run to Lot's Wife's given name.
This map was much older than Lot's Wife was when she married.
Now Old Harry had his fingers in these needles—
pulling down ships faster than a fast ship-pulling beast,
one that could pull down even the least fastest of those fast ships.
I suspect gravity had a hand in those fingers,
and the rocks below the tips of those needles
were not entirely innocent of this naval mischief.
Dirty weather indeed, as Conrad would put it.
