Crosby Beach is where I always felt on holiday right in my own city. I’ve held hands with the loves of my life on this beach. Seen sunsets and horizon lines disappear.
I’ve been buried neck deep in the sand, dodged icky washed up sea creatures and joined the Iron Men looking out, hoping, dreaming, waiting. I once fell asleep here with my love by my side, holding hands while he read me poetry. We woke up so sunburned it wasn’t even funny. This is one of the poems.
Drunk as drunk on turpentine
from your open kisses,
your wet body wedged
between my wet body and the strake
of our boat that is made of flowers,
feasted, we guide it – our fingers
like tallows adorned with yellow metal –
Over the sky’s hot rim,
the day’s last breath in our sails.
Pinned by the sun between solstice and equinox,
drowsy and tangled together we drifted for months
and woke with the bitter taste of land on our lips,
eyelids all sticky,
and we longed for lime
and the sound of a rope lowering a bucket down its well.
Then, we came by night to the Fortunate Isles,
and lay like fish under the net of our kisses.
Pablo Neruda.
Now I lie alone in a darkened room with my cat for company and a reason to keep going. The cruelty of M.E. is not knowing how much energy I’ll be afforded every day or how long it’ll last. It’s typically very little and has rendered me housebound and weak.
No one seems to care or want to understand it. There’s not enough research or awareness. There’s no cure for M.E. There’s no definitive treatment plan and not much hope for the future. I’m still the same person I was and more, and if anything this illness has helped me realise a lot of things I didn’t expect of myself.
I’m fiercely independent and defiant. I’m a passionate creative person with ambitions and dreams however far away they seem now. I care about the environment, animals and every single person I know and don’t know yet.
I love nature and I miss being in it. I especially miss standing where you are now. And thinking about this place, hoping I can visit again, keeps me from dark thoughts. When I think of Crosby Beach I can almost hear the ebb and flow of the sea, the families playing together. I can smell the sand and the salty sea air. I hear the wildlife and the distant music and the dogs.
I hope one day to be able to visit and paint this beach, I’d hang it in my room and feel just that little bit closer from my bed. Please don’t ever take this beautiful place for granted. You might not get the chance to visit again. Look up from your phone, stand and soak it in so you can remember just in case.
