Screaming our tits off

Our clothes in a bundle near dogs chasing dogs
our footprints in the direction of the water.
At first I’d worried about my new trainers being stolen
and dying,
but as soon as we’d shouted 1, 2, 3 and ran
into waves taller than basketball players
we no longer had the ability to control things,
could do nothing but scream our tits off,
Primal Screaming our bank statements away
all worries about exes and bad backs and career choices
had been left on the beach
tucked up with our socks in the toes of our shoes as we unleashed
toxins from our ribcages.

The ocean is the opposite of traffic jams.
In the sea you have never felt further away
from the Starbucks queue at Welcome Break. Junction 28.
When our heads were underwater we entered a world
without A roads and mini roundabouts.
The only thing that mattered was survival.
We’ve all heard those stories about people who did a fun thing
and then died
dinghies floating over horizons and we were dancing with hypothermia
that odd contradiction of screaming your tits off
with the tranquillity of breaststroke.

Swimming has always been my happy place
ever since those days of me, my sister and my dad
walking to the leisure centre on Saturday mornings
a 25 metre badge sewn on my cloth bag
I was prouder of that than any degree
and we were in the sea for maybe a minute.
90 seconds, max, before swimming back, grabbing our stuff
and legging it to the disabled toilets to get changed
and as I waited while you dried your hair
goosepimples disappeared under my jumper.