Going Down to the Sea Again

A cockney born and bred,
as a child, how I longed
for summer. The call of the sea
leaving me breathless – gasping
for air and the needing to know
if there was a sky up there
beyond high rise council flats
and factory stacks...Yearning
to return, like a migratory bird.

Till the boarding of a train
on our yearly pilgrimage
to Broadstairs. The asking
Mum and Dad if we were
‘in the country now’; cow-pat
spotting with my sister. How much
bluer and bigger the sky was
and how I’d get smuts in my eye
if I sat too close to the window
going through a tunnel...

and how I cringed deep inside
when Mum spat on her hanky –
rubbed my nose, cheek or chin...
and lost track of the times
I was scolded for asking,
“Are we there yet?”

And how I felt as I’d stand
on the corrugated sand
with foam frothing
white around my ankles;
on the brink of diving in.
Elated, excited, but
at the same time, terrified.

Exactly like you – that day,
that summer, when I saw
you feel it too; going back,
for what you knew would be
the last time. Your blue eyes,
gray with pain, scanning
the horizon. Hearing
the seagulls cry. Looking
for a ship that never came.