A photograph of you sitting on a white plastic seat on the Hook of Holland/Harwich ferry in the midday sunlight on August 13th

Although I never said
exactly what I was thinking,
and although I realise
that twenty-three years is a long time to have waited
and the moment
may not be as fresh
or as brilliantly lit with the sun
shattering on the wake we left behind us
on the North Sea,

and despite the fact that for the previous week
I had been telling myself just to be myself,
that this was as good as it could get,
short of the world ending,

and even discounting
the awesome synchronicity
that still clicks in when we are close
and which makes you radiant beyond the broken water
on the photograph I took
instead of reaching slowly over to kiss you
after the brief, platonic hug,

and allowing for other factors
such as the intervening time,
children,
marriage
and other loves,

and given the fact we were both so young,
relatively,
I think you must have known
how I felt.

You are smiling at me.

And I am still there,
hidden behind the tiny lens,
dying and amazed.