Turned up coats shuffle along the edge, wearily but sure footed.
Mute, suited and booted
Some are still in a daze,
With bits of breakfast round the corners of mouths.
/
After braving the January morning,
We huddle for shelter.
Alarms signal the sealing of doors
and a collective sigh breathes out.
/
London:
(THE EPICENTRE OF THE UNIVERSE)
/
In all this space there’s not much room to manoeuvre.
The mess of limbs squashed in like rushed Picasso strokes.
/
Read / stare / look, but don’t see.
Sit / stand / think of what could be.
/
As still as the reflection of black mirrors.
Dim slivers of light
Tremors
/
Next station: Charing Cross.
We’re right on course
/
Conversing in
Binary
Code and
Morse,
/
Editing / repenting / confessing,
Shouting loud Chinese whispers behind glass.
/
How can you tell if a plain clothes officer is on your journey?
People. Everywhere. The worthiest sum is the combined total of smaller parts.
(IF YOU SEE SOMEONE SUSPICIOUS REPORT THEM TO THE POLICE IMMEDIATELY)
/
Slack jawed / Headsets tune in and drop out.
Autopilot switched on
White noise fills the floor
And the crew are silent.
/
Imagine –
The material in this cabin.
The memories that leave indelible marks,
Like bruises on a peach.
/
Life lessons teachers don’t teach:
Vertigo isn’t really a fear of heights, it’s the fear of wanting to jump
/
(MIND THE GAP)
/
I want
to go back
to sleep.
/
Whatever promise this day holds, it cannot contend with the ether of sleep.
Can’t compete with the complete retreat / feathered nest / it can’t be beat.
/
(Work wins every morning)
The siren song of newspapers and tea.
/
If it bleeds
It leads.
The insatiable appetite to see (and be seen)
/
Everything’s fine
(KEEP CALM AND CARRY ON)
/
Shop
‘til you drop.
Give me more.
Shock and awe
On the trading floor.
/
“Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free”
Please leave.
The doors are shut,
/
(NO ROOM AT THE INN)
/
What’s yours is mine,
Clock in and work overtime.
Team meetings teach me
There’s no I in we.
/
(Surprisingly)
/
The train shudders to a stop,
The compartments spill their innards
And the sluice gates open.
/
What a mess.
/
A stony Edith Cavell looks down on me, declaring:
“Patriotism is not enough, I must have no hatred or bitterness towards anyone.”
/
Her statue reads –
Devotion,
Fortitude,
Sacrifice,
Humanity.
/
Outside St. Martin’s Vestry Hall,
A soup kitchen queue snakes round the square,
And all I do
is stare.
Thomas Dylan Bolger 