7pm in the Warm Months

There was something about that time of day;
that honey light,
shadows making giraffes of us all.
Something about the sweet
closing of a day,
the warm copper and bronze
that takes me to my memories;
A day by the sea,
skin tight with salt and sun.
The day ending,
searching for a jumper
pulled over sand-smoothed skin,
And those long shadows
ghosts on cobbled seafronts
peppered with dropped chips.
The smell of that last,
vinegar-soaked chip
squashed at the bottom of the cone,
sodden and tart.
The swell of water on picnic tables;
old condensation from sweating chilled glasses
washing the beer mats clean.
I would beg for a taste
of the lager my father had ordered,
and clutch the pint glass
with small, tanned hands.
Pretending I loved it.
My sister and I salt-crusted,
Mum would swipe our faces with
oil of evening primrose,
as we squirmed and squirmed.
Coastal sleep comes easy;
legs tired from swimming,
clambering,
heart healthy from the
hot, hazy endlessness of it all.
I see that time of day
and the long last hours
bathed in spun gold,
and it takes me there;
evenings by the sea.