Apollo Takes His Ease

The late sun settles on the strand,
golden back arched around the cove:
Apollo takes his ease on a shingle chaise...
But enough of whimsy;
I am on holiday and far from notebooks
in which such observations might find a welcome line.

The last charabanc is long since gone
and young savages in sunscreen woad
packed into hatchbacks for the journey home,
shoes full of sand and plastic buckets
sadly empty of shells, for the Harpic-blue sea
seems emptier of life each year.

Along the cliff-top, like an establishing scene
from an episode of Poirot, shines a scatter
of Deco houses, all whitewashed curves
and chrome-barred windows, their back gardens
shrinking with each tide. The path I walked
last summer is red tumbled rock and stubborn scrub grass.

Now the coast is clear, locals emerge
to walk their dogs or take metal detectors
for a stroll. They wear sensible clothes
and knotted faces like driftwood carvings from the souvenir shop,
while I lounge in a T-shirt that bares
my barbecued arms and proclaims the slogan wit of Primark.

I perch on the high-tide mark with trouser legs
rolled up and pop black blisters of bladderwrack.
I could live here easy: all my belongings
in one suitcase and barely one signal bar
on my mobile phone. In the winter, they say,
the wind has teeth and the haar is a smuggler’s shroud.