My childhood was spent at Whitby and at Tynemouth, small towns with beautiful beaches on England's North East coast. Both have ruined abbeys above a picturesque headland. Both have NE England's often disappointing summer weather.

THE TIDAL ZONE

Two regimes in conflict
Alternate twice a day,
Offering the opposites:
Close contact or airy indifference.
Drenching, swirling water
With nuzzling, kissing sway:
This might pull and drag you,
Legless, into depths where you have no chance!

Air has no force to pull you.
You cower, undisturbed,
Clamped close against the dryness,
Anchored tight, or buried in sand;
But this peace has nothing to offer;
Here comes the hungry bird.
Oh, for the circling water,
Nourishment and freedom, grand!

Growing up in a war zone,
The soft lives of the shore
Harden to the warring forces,
Grab what existence they can;
Inside their rocklike protection,
Survival, and nothing more;
First law: to protect their weakness;
Invulnerable; alone.

Not here the social network
Of family life, or clan:
Mutual interdependence
For rearing, play or hunt.
Armoured individuals,
Immovable, so nothing can
Penetrate a tender corner,
Touch them, for love or hurt.

The clash of enemy forces,
Drying air, or swish of sea –
So many human children
Are caught by the raging tides!
Hardened by others’ conflict
Who can help them to be
Warm and loving and tender,
All that the armour hides?