Memories are all we have

Feeling happy, feeling sad,

Thinking of the distance

That separates us over time

Unless, of course, you wanna

Get stuck in the eternal present

And that just aint pleasant .

One high English summer day in 1984

We took our daughter, Kate,

To the Dorset coast.

She was eighteen months young

My wife was pregnant with our second child

Anna, who will give birth to her third child soon.

On this day in late summer 1984

We parked in Westminster road

Near Milford-on-sea and I carried

Kate in her carry cot down to the beach

More or less near the sea

Built sand castles, ate cheese sandwiches

Drank tea from a flask, played with her,

And, at last, packed up,

Went home to London

That day-by-the-sea recurs to me

In memory very often.

I will think about that

At my last.