LIKE THE SPANISH CITY

The days have gone;

the laughter and shrieks

blown away.

We have all grown up,

left old Catalonian dreams 

and the blazing seaside bullfights.

We are dazed,

phased out.

Spaces where we courted

bulldozed

to make way

for the tack of tomorrow;

the hope in the sea breeze;

the distant echo of castanets

and voices scraping

in a dusty rotunda.

I remember where I kissed you,

where I lost you.

It was in Spain, wasn’t it?

Or was it down the Esplanade

on a wet Sunday in July?

Either way,

we are still

twinned with sunny Whitley Bay,

and flaming Barcelona too;

and our lives

will dance in fading photographs

from the pleasure dome,

whenever we leave home.

KEITH ARMSTRONG