I wrote this poem for my writers group, Maggies’ Creatives, led by the excellent Clare Stuart. They meet at the Maggies Centre in Manchester every Thursday and let me join them on Zoom.

Then and Now

I

Locals on our double-deckers, tourists in their charabancs

Empty onto promenade, enlivened by the salty tang

Of fresh sea air

We come well stocked with bread and jam and crisps and fizzy pop.

Unlike the visitors we have no need to spend in shops.

So we must stare

While they scoff their fish and ships, candy floss and sticks of rock.

Honours even out when we, townies versus grockles, run amok

Till parents make a fuss.

So on to donkey rides and games with new made friends who came

From pit and mill and foundry towns, but children all the same,

Children just like us.

We stake our claims to isles of sand upon a shingled beach.

Our moated castles built with paper flags on turrets each

Proclaiming sovereignty.

Beyond the tide-marked boundary between the land and sea

Airbeds join the ebb and flow with folk like you and me

Towards infinity.

Then the lifeguards dash and splash and knife the life from the

Inflatables, unsuitable to sail upon the sea,

Bring people safely home.

II

Now the boats are borne towards us on inflowing tides

Overloaded, sinking, people clinging to the sides,

Drowning in the foam.

Vessels launched against the stream crash against the waves

And dash to reach the stricken boats so some lives can be saved

And given sanctuary.

They hark from war and famine zones, these folks like me and you

They come because they have no other choice if they are ever to

Live like you and me.