Somewhere seabirds pipe and bleat,
gathered on a dark low tide.
Shapes and shadows line the fleet,
cold and calling.

In the shore hide facing north
I'm focussing black ten-by-forties,
hunched against the wall for warmth;
the tide still falling.

Looking out, I'm looking back,
thirty years have ebbed away;
the boy, his joy, his haversac,
his notebook scrawling;

I see him, tremulous, wild-eyed,
among the plovers, curlew, knot,
a loosed dog shakes them and he flies,
the seawall salt sting cuts and dries;
there's no recalling.