Narbonne

Oh Narbonne!
Cathedral St Just standing high
Above the plain, its arms straddling the sea
I love to take you on a Sunday morning
Swimming in the crowds as they shop and sell
at the market that runs both sides of the Canal de la Robine.

The smell and sights of foods and fruit shimmering in the covered market.
How I like to ooze through, take a beer at a bar, and sidle by Notre Dame de Lamourguier
Where inside Roman statues stand and gape,
Then walk back over the canal where once the Via Domita ran
Uncovered now in the main square where the manikins of the belles dames of France look down.
How the wheels must have bumped when Centurians went on their way
To villas in vineyards in distant hills.
Now must we crawl and fall into the horreum, the dark subterranean storehouse
Or wander a few yards to where St Sebastien, the saint martyred by the slaughter of arrows, was born,
And to his church standing in a web of streets and alleys that make us explore

Oh Narbonne!
Cathedral St Just standing high
Above the plain, its arms straddling the sea
I love to take you on a Sunday morning
Swimming in the crowds as they shop and sell
at the market that runs both sides of the Canal de la Robine

© Giles Denmark97