Cleethorpes

Cleethorpes

Somewhere, somewhere, there’s a gritty tasting day:

when teeth were sandpapered by sandwich paste

that bitter-lippped the tongue.

A beach made less of sand

and more of clay

where the promised castles

stick tight in the muddy bucket.

 Horizoning sea far too long away,

somewhere between

a sullen humdrum Humber

and a sky tinted ash grey:

well, because we’re both ghosts now.

Still, you take my hand,

a boy aged seven

(or there and thereabouts)

with long, gone, forgotten, innocent brow

and you, yourself, unfurrowed and

still, as yet, unploughed.

Thick, boot-black crested hair

that falls in a hopeful comma upon kind eyes.

More an exclamation mark than a question:

A pause amid this and that,

between unconditional and conditions

across the void of vision and decision.

We stride towards the thin blue line,

my reluctant hand in yours,

for, Dad, it is surely too far away?

Small legs and unsandaled sole

struggle to measure up

alongside long strides towards the blue,

like your gaze,

rolling, thundering, silent screaming:

to your scattered futures go.

And Cleethorpes’ clay is cast with worms,

abandoned until the tide returns;

silent sharp razor shells’ bladed teeth

hiding deep beneath the grief.

Strewn seabirds cyclone; backpedaling skies

with futile swoops and whirlpooling cries,

they warn against attempts to fly.

With a childish grin, you shrug, then shoulder

the feckless complaining boy,

for what will be, will be,

and this is the sea.

Sweeping ocean winds urchin our hair,

and just this once, we dream and dare.