WriteShed

Thoughts. Ideas. Scribbles.


Bamburgh on the Beach

I must have started this poem sometime ago. It must have been after visiting Bamburgh beach again – I don’t remember. Anyway, I found it recently and have made a few changes, mainly cutting stuff away. I put it here because it reminds me of the time when my children were young and we all played on the beach as if we didn’t have a care in the world. Maybe we didn’t. Maybe it’s just that we felt safe.


Bamburgh on the Beach

Six years before the sea was just as cold. 

I came here with five kids 
trailing in my wake like gulls with buckets 
wind-breaks 
and some idea of how the day would end.
   
‘Get your socks off, come on dad,’ my freed feet 
danced on the wet sand like a beached 
fish. I felt 
a soft hand 
lead mine. 

We journeyed 
stood face to face with emptiness 
as icy waves   
tried to reach our knees. 

‘I love this place 
let's build a castle.’

We all raced, laughed, rearranged 
spadefuls of damp sand until someone heard 
the picnic call.   

Kids only need small portions of time.

I closed my eyes 
felt the sound of the sea-shell    
lift my skin in waves as deep as the cold 
that smooths the sand. 

As our day tired 
we watched debris swim back and forth 
unable to let go.



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