On the strung out seafront,
bits of boat line up.
Parts of the ship packed port. Pulled up
on hard packed pebbles.
Actual boats. Looking like you could
get between them. And swim.
Take off clothes and jump in.
To this muddy estuary where you
might catch fish.
All the dreams,
strung on the seafront,
for remembering.
If you rush past on the boardwalk,
not looking and not going in,
you might miss your dream.
Maybe this isn't your end of town.
And these are old dreams,
Ships, not going anywhere new now.
Gone over. Trodden in.
Played out. Played in.
All the different dreams,
with everyone in.
ooo
Set Back
The Hinterland Dream Park,
where, come winter
trees turn into girls
and go for a wander.
It was winter. A lot.
The trees had gone for good.
Replaced. Cleared. Packed off into cities
as amenities. Trees being bees knees.
Honestly? trees shouted across plazas,
to each other, few and far betweenly,
there isn't any forest left to speak of.
This will have to do. For now.
So they did their buds
and dropped their leaves
And felt about as real as trees feel.
Then they got wired with lights.
Which can get in the way
of what a tree would wish.
In winter trees wish a lot of things
and some of them come true.
Like mushrooms.
The tree that turned into the thin girl
wore a great big hat.
Which she flung off.
And then it was just her,
going for a wander,
through the ship packed port.
ooo
Sea Level 2
Sometimes, when you're out at sea, fishing, or maybe you just took off your clothes and swum out there one
night, you can look back and see the front with all those lights and the trees where the girls
made everything glitter.
In the morning, if you're still out there, the trees on the front are a thin strip of see through forest and
you can see how empty of them the land behind really is. The muddy, scoured and scrubbed run off land. With
hardly any trees. Really. No wonder they move to the city. At least in the city you get an idea. Of the forest you
could be. Even if it is all strung out.
It's a city that has spread. Through different places it has made part of itself. And now it's strung out
city of shoreline.
Seafront city.
With hinterlands. Like the picked at parts of a ribbon. Stretching inland. Suburbs. Washed and hung out to dry.
Roped to the seafront by bus routes and amenities.
The other way, whole sides of country. To visit.
Not that there's time, says the city. For that. You're better off here anyway.
You can always swim out. For a better look. You might be saved out there. Picked up. Taken off.
But in the end you swim back. And get on with the downsouth way of things. Strung out.
It's not like you can complain. Seafront city is a bit of breathing space, compared to the
wound up ball of ship packed port. The city of the shoreline is made for walking, taking your time. It can take
forever to get anywhere, but there's always something, along the way. Even if it's just thoughts of the ship
packed port. That you'll soon be headed back into.
ooo
Bus
All the houses are the same
and who knows where I am.
I went round the back
But the backs looked the same as well.
Eventually I found Dan’s dad’s place.
With Dan and his dad in.
Dan’s dad was getting a bus
so we helped him onto that.
When it was time to go Dan was getting a bus as well.
We set off for the stop where I’d got off.
But was miles and in no time we were lost.
Because everyhere was the same.
I said I thought this was the way.
But only because it looked brightly lit and a bit different.
It turned out to be the swoop down into a discreet hotel entrance.
That got more private and less like we should have been there with every step.
When we got to where cars stop on nice bricks three naked women were sat in a fountain.
The fountain was well lit and splashed cheerily.
I was keeping to the far wall, trying to get on and not be noticed by security.
But Dan, being Dan, ran over and jumped in. Fully clothed. To cavort wittily.
The women laughed. Security laughed. I had a chat with one of the next shift
before she got into the fountain. About barrier creams.
Dan got out before anything could turn into trouble and we carried on up the exit ramp.
And then away from the front. To where buses stopped.
We were still lost.
Everywhere was still the same.
The city stretched along the coast.
Nothing lasts forever.
It was late and the buses were filling up.
One went past. That looked like Dan’s
but it wasn’t at a stop
and the doors didn’t open.
You couldn’t tell if it was headed
out of town or back in.
We both thought that things would work out
if we kept going.
ooo
On the beach
(centrespot)
At the shore a curve of holiday bay.
Two rafts bob. Grouped boys and girls.
Rehearsing adult nothing.
I go in for a swim. In goes a girl,
surprising as the moon
in my head as I dive down
into three or four muddy feet
out beyond the long waves.
You open your eyes down there,
to impossible colour.
A bright and busy cartoon
kiss of a fish
darts by in search of itself.
Older ones stand back on their tails.
Seahorse like. Fluttering.
When we're all done swimming,
we play ballgames.
Passing and shooting.
Winning and losing.
Making our own ways back.
ooo
Burnished gold
The burnished and crumpled
gold letterbox. With night in.
It's curve a smile of possibility.
The sun dips down
in the ship packed port.
Past spiky spires and catchy crosstrees.
If they look up everyone sees
just another loser. On the way down.
The sun collapses, through each crosstree.
Too hot to handle, me,
thinks the sun.
And then, cooling,
Not so bad really.
Here.
ooo
Sea Level
The flat. Or pretty close to it. Sea
you could walk all over.
But you stay in cities on the edge.
Not going anywhere new now.
All very different from the mountains
it's taken ages to get out of.
Mountains here are a dream.
Inlets. Lochcarron and Kintail.
Come down to the flat.
We looked at a place there once,
that reached back into the hills
but had come down to the shore,
to the road and everything new.
Same as everyone.
ooo
Ferry
Queuing for the ferry. From a popular seafront. Even if you're not getting it you can still come down to
watch.Ferries from cafes. The cafes are pushed back into buildings. Because the seafront itself is all white line and loading lane.
Like vehicular comings and goings are the only show in town. All around, language students eat
icecream.
I drive round in circles on the empty white lined tarmac trying to find the end of the queue.
I appear to have jumped it. So I circle round again, like I've
just arrived. When I come back to where I think the end of the queue was, all the other cars have gone.
Onboard. I drive down the ramp that is filling up with cooly ice cream licking pedestrian language students.
I shout at them, to stop them damaging my car. The ramp is onto a pontoon. A sort of halfway place.
With no one saying where to go next.
A number of ferries throb like they might be about to leave. Everything's up in the air. Those ramps are thin
metal. When everything you've got is in your car and there's only metal plates like that between getting on and sinking like a stone,
your heart goes into your mouth. Like your mouth was a ledge that your heart might leap from.
I follow the ramps and reach a ferry. Which appears to be the correct
one as ferrymen are beckoning me on. In my car. I drive around the deck. Between white lines. To where they say I
should go, at the stern. A space at the side on the fantastically complex sloping deck. Surely they can't expect me to
park in there. Those bulky ferry men. Who beckon. In between covering the most recent
cars with tired blue seafaring canvas. To protect them from the weather. They are waiting for me like I'm
one of those last ones who always cause a problem. All the cars seem to have shrunk. To a pocket size. Like I
could get out of mine and vrrm it into the space by hand. But I'm going to be realistic about this. And do it properly.
The bulky ferrymen aren't bothered. They take over. Swinging me a salty old rope. To haul my
pedestrian self up the complex slope to the passenger deck. Maybe it's because I'm late. Surely not all drivers and
passengers are treated this badly. I continue to be realistic. It's not just me. There's an old man and his son still stuck on the
cardeck. Together the three of us make it up the complex slope, to a door. The door has been boarded up with damp
chipboard. Which we unpick to get through. Bulky ferrymen hang around, waiting for things to get under
way. They don't help. The door goes through into a luggage hold. Racks and stacks of everyone's luggage. Enough
to make you think you could lose everything here. And never see it again. You'd better hold onto what you've got.
And pull yourselves up the stairs that are starting to shake. Now we're under way.
ooo
Canna
You've headed down to Brighton.
Stood on all the stones.
When you tried to wade in,
you found yourself walking out
on a surface of small balls.
That get bigger the further you go.
They start out grain of sand size,
then ballbearing, squashball,
football. All at sea. Like on
the surfaces that bobble
round pedestrian crossings
so you know where you are.
The bobbles get bigger.
The further out you go
There are balls out there
you can spend whole nights in.
Though you're not sure you'd want to
leave the land that far behind.
You keep an eye on it. The land.
So it can be got back to.
Everything waves.
When storms come you put in.
And so you come to Canna.
ooo
Back of the van
They say that cities start
with winter bridges.
Growing round them.
The winter bridges you come down to
when your own dreams are done
and all you can manage is
getting down to the bridge.
In winter. Getting on it.
Up there. And over.
On bridges that are new.
Better than the old ways.
When it doesn't work out,
at the end of the bridges,
where people come off them.
cities build up.
Cities you stay in
Help me out with this will you.
Help me out with that.
Pat helped Mr Dylett
with something heavy.
One of those old postboxes.
Talking Round Things
What's this then, said Pat.
As he helped Mr Dylett lift it
out of the van.
It was too heavy for Mr Dylett
on his own
Letterbox, said Mr Dylett.
Prenationalisation.
They stood it up for a better look.
It was burnished and battered
where people had posted their letters
and ran their hands around
where the letters had gone.
A look, Mr Dylett's practised eye
told him, someone would want.
He practised his patter on Pat.
Passing it off. The patter. As chat.
Companies used to compete
to make their letterbox
the one you went to.
A lot of work went into
a letterbox like this.
They popped up all over.
The more of them you saw
the more likely you'd put letters in.
The more work that went into them,
the more trustworthy they seemed.
Put your letters in a box like this
- here he slapped the top of it -
they'd really get somewhere.
Take off. Fly.
Pat ran his hand over the burnished top,
where it was worn gold,
and mail wasn't national. Or royal
Or even hauled by pony.
Somewhere things always
meant to go.
That's belgian. Who's going to buy that.
Said Alfie Monday. Who'd arrived
too late to really help.
We'll see. Said Mr Dylett.
Who liked to show off his
practised good eye.
And was well aware that today,
soon, there would be a liner in the bay,
and that it's disembarked passengers,
when they'd been ferried here
and ferried there, would be making
just one more stop to pick up the
thing they'd never have thought of.
That you couldn't say no to.
It was the sort of stop that
this bay of winds
had got used to being.
When the liners were in.
The passengers came in waves.
By the time they'd got to this bit
all they wanted was water to drink
and somewhere to sit.
In the cafe, it was politely explained
that such things needed paying for.
Browsing, of course, was free.
Discretionary. At your leisure.
And so, same as in the last place,
the disembarked did that. If nothing else
it made getting back to the ship
seem like a good idea. In the meantime
they drifted through parts of the place.
Like fog come in off the sea. Ha.
All this getting away and going back.
In waves. Gettting away
and going back. Like that
was what waves were for.
In the fog
that isolates
things from things.
ooo
Her patch
Up from the beach
for something to eat,
meant the boardwalk,
which meant hanging in there and
not forgetting what you wanted.
You came away with stuff you
didn't need and spilled
Easy pickings for Lennie.
People got this haunted look
the further you went along the boardwalk,
from spending too long on it.
Trying to get where they were going.
They frowned. Moved faster
than the crowd that strolled.
Forgetting it was supposed to be
all about the beach.
Lennie had entertainments that could
make you stop. Make you stare.
Laugh out loud. Lose your underwear.
It wasn't always snakes
Lennie tipped out onto the step.
It could be painted chicks. Or just eggs.
Cheap sweets. That she'd made herself.
You trod on them and paid for them
Where Lennie is on the boardwalk
depends on how things are going.
When crowds shrink
from the western sands
Lennie is east,
round the net lofts
where anything might happen.
There are whole bits of seafront
you rush through.
Uninterested in boating lakes.
Crazy mini golf. Or tennis.
Any of the fun with fences
You want to be back on the beach,
where everyone you love is.
Everyone you came with.
Getting there is always
quickest by boardwalk.
That bit quicker than crossing the sands,
which are muddy here
or going through town,
which you don't really know.
So it's the boardwalk.
The way you go.
ooo
Tidal Bus
(Further Out)
Two heads bob,
bodied in ocean.
Chatting in wetsuits.
Swimming further out is ok.
Everyone on rocks
is very far away.
Your feet on a sandbank.
And you're not the only ones
stood about out here.
The tide has kept on going out
and now there is all this new land.
A joy. Relief. Still,
Tides turn and waves come.
Wonders pass like fish and,
all in all, it would probably be better
if you made your way back
to where you were. All in all.
So that's what you do.
Scrambling up the shore.
There is no big wave and
the tide comes back in it's own time.
In the meantime a number of buses
have made their way across the bay,
using the sands as a shortcut.
In the meantime you lose each other
between buses.
The rock you dived in from
Has a bus shelter on.
When you were out there,
dodging hovercraft that swung about
on the fresh new surfaces
you didn't see any buses.
Now you're waiting for the ferry
that docks at the rock
when the bus can't go.
