tripping ~ over the seaside

            tripping ~ over the seaside

dad wore a pak-a-mak over his suit and tie

mum a concertina plastic hood over a blue rinse

on the beach   after the rain had stopped

sitting sideways on drying sand looking at the camera

new quay wales and an iron slipway rail behind them

and the hotels behind that and the sea somewhere else

somewhere else the picnic bus was parked and we looked

all around the seaside town for meat and two veg and

a cup of tea as nice as homemade behind lace curtains

the sun toppling over the time of day longing to be

out of mum and dad’s hands where i could explore

things that were not the things i knew but the things 

i knew were new to me all this way in the coming on

the bus that every summer repeated   soon you will see

and the sea will remember you even if you do not remember

the seaside tripping over that day’s yearning

and again and again over today’s yearning 

that it was all yesterday once more