They’re all on strike today and the day before that too. The doctors, the teachers, postal workers and the late Southern workers.
the radio says they’re selfish, caring about them own, devil may care about the repercussions.
we’re all fractured, aspiring for a togetherness, in spiteful factions. Blind to other’s pleas.
Croydon doesn’t have any new council houses, but we’ve got a new council building
and someone built us all a lovely new Box Park.
I read somewhere that parents spend less time with their children than 40 years ago.
And this thought spins in my head as I see your daughter in silence,
Her hands plaited on her lap. Her mother the other end of the 312.
Partisan extremism seems to be on the rise these days.
We all want to be part of something.
What lingers in the air is the scent of, mum’s cooking
cooked by someone’s Aunty from Spanish-town.
New black Bimmers pulling up
to get a recession priced chicken & rice.
Prams and pushers slowing down the 312,
and some fool claims his new oyster card’s ‘in the post‘.
The sky’s blue,
cracking through new build Aldi and the ancient maisonette.
It’s quiet today, the school children at home preparing for school tomorrow,
And the response they’ll give to ‘Where’s your homework!?’
And still after 20 years I love you all the same.
Wise to your failings and flaws.
Your potential
and your trembling peace.
I remember you from a former life,
from a track
ran by road-youths.
before adult reality’s claxton,
screamed our cease.
In my mind I still
Visit you.
We never drifted.
There was no loss,
no flood of blood,
washing away your innocence.
Held at ransom by the Foxton Cartel,
Local 2 bed mansions – guilded
in wheelie bin refuse, styled beaten brick chic.
Unattainable from the past’s sepia optimism.
la vie indisponible
available part ownership, deposit
a 100% addition to the student deficit.
Discounts free
to those with finances pristine Waitrose white.
25% of your days,
for your net total years.
a scheme helping the capital
grasp at the 1%’s remnance.
To venture with an old friend
Or advance a trembling true love,
Inflate your equity
To bleed for the benevolent extortion.
Your life now only available in part-
ownership.
21.
In your eyes
I see, that those presented
as most strong, are those
most complicit in deceit.
***
22.
Who controls what we think?
Sometimes I tell myself
I do
***
23.
I’m trapped again,
stuck to your sweet voice,
your whispered honeydew words
leaving a brilliant sheen
in my bronze eyes.
***
24.
I await your lips
in water’s reprieve,
arrhythmic heart trembling
within my sleeve.
***
25.
I could have died,
left
alone
in your heart.
*****
My love,
my mouth once knew your name.
far from these grand walls that part us,
thier spiteful spires casting a shadow
over the life of our former other.
From my minaret
to my domain I preach:
Prowess and accomplishments
-spitting
the cinders of burnt love.
From your tower I hear calls to prayer
To drink the wine of projected Perfection.
And with my jealousy concealed,
I no longer observe your commands.
Our social empires impose motionless taunts
our worlds locked in heated stalemate
unblinking,clocking each others move.
What tore us asunder?
My library knows well its history.
I a scholar…
of the downfall
of its date
of the blame.
Between us sand blew hot,
an arid gorge we created,
the empty wind lapping at our crumbling walls.
Within Our domain we’re but void caverns
-to a stale spite.
But Seasons turned, as droughts relief drips cool air,
And our cold war ceases.
Flags, doves snow afloat
-freed… In an air without heat.
We
no longer catapulting silence,
regaling all with single sided words,
salt the earth with propaganda;
searing hearts with volleys of words afire.
We
caress with hands sowing seeds of truce
All has been freed by time
Our conflict ended by fatigue;
-a perfunctory peace.
My former love,
I still wonder at your walls
Their shadows reaching my breast,
From what did our war arise?
I still recall
but no longer feel.
for Alina Baraz
Transient through the Urban Flora of London’s south,
I Drift atop rolling waves,
their depths rising, enveloping all
in each passing rock of the Bakerloo.
Deluged in Pretty Thoughts, serene
I Unfold words with each bars heartbeat,
poetry within each ear’s bud -caressed in my carriage,
I blossom your Jasmine words.
J.C. FitzDerick 