Kite or swallow?

A scarlet lozenge, a convention of a kite

-the kites we had as kids looked nothing like that when

we flew them on the chalk hill's humpbacked height

but still - a geometric diagram transected, then 

an s-curved tail, a knotted row of bright

blue bows, which looked at once again

prove to be messages on paper, folded tight.

Unfolding them I see some say

"Sorry no prize, please have another go!"

With some the words break up, trickle away,

lose sense and pattern, but just a few do show

solidity and meaning, substantial forms which stay

with me, find lodging there, and grow 

into companions for another day.

Seeing the world from up there where the kite

is flying, the human figure tweaking at the string

is small, expressionless, below, its movements slight,

the distant hills a convex line, the sun a thing

to conjure with, and throw another light

onto the blue-black oil-plume of the swallow's wing,

its joyous, startling, acuity of flight.

And as it flashes by the blue hills' bow

past other skylines, where the sea moves grey

and gulls and gannets plunge and swing

into the wave troughs' crackled white,

to roost in palms in lands where men

wave birdlimed brushes to and fro,

if you could follow, would you go?