The Seafront

by Howard Wright

The worrying croak of swings. Nobody there.
Wrapped up in themselves, taking what’s on offer,
people are mistaken in what they might find there:
childhood, small rebellions; a breath of salty air;
something to stay forever that was never really there.
They think twice, half-hoping to travel as far by car,
hearing that nothing had changed down there
since ships moored in what was then the harbour.
Some even say, with justification, nothing was there
in the first place. Chips from a backstreet trailer,
probably, but that’s neither here nor there.
Ice cream in the park by the seawall, foul or fair?
A roundabout painfully turns. Nobody there.