Starbucks; hiss and steaming muzzles
where the thinnest person crunches
a door-shut again and again
because it’s winter, draughty, freezing.
In concrete, Canary Wharfe shudders
and a fat lady hangs an ermine coat,
spills her coffee – cappuccino.
No one mentions the gigantic puddle
until a tiny Chinese barmaid,
smiling, mops it mostly up with paper towels.
Unconscious, we avoid the messy circle,
un-angry
if you call that, in your opinion,
a proper word.
occassional word play is acceptable, one must know the proper time to use it. Your use of it at the end of thee poem, reminds me of a literary snob *smiley*
ReplyDeleteLove london, was there in October. The city takes my breath away.
ReplyDeletePs: great poem; you are an observer, a poet, do you know it??
Cool! I feature an excerpt from American 20th century poet Hart Crane's poem "To Brooklyn Bridge" on my blog tomorrow, Dec 15th.
ReplyDeletelove the use of run on lines
ReplyDeleterather like e.e cummings too
I love this, plain and simple.
ReplyDeleteI was going to mention the strange use of the word "muzzles" and upon reading again the Merriam definition thought twice and said okay, but then in following up with the imagery mentioned I thought twice and second guess myself (GADS noooo) so I said to myself it was okay so I relaxed as I thought it so strange people have traumatized imagery from the strangest things. So some how I liked something about it. Someone call my shrink!
ReplyDeleteBrilliant :)
ReplyDeleteun-angry. Not a usual word, but fits like a glove in this poem. It is such simplicity that is difficult to come by. Wonderful read indeed.
ReplyDeleteWords are always important there use may change the meaning of the sentence.
ReplyDeleteFantastic!
ReplyDeleteNicely observed slice of city life. I loved your word choice that brought this all into focus. Very well done.
ReplyDeleteBrilliant. :-)
ReplyDeleteWhy un-angry? I would've thought she'd be cross. But I like the structure of the poem and the images.
ReplyDeleteI love your use of an unword.
ReplyDeleteIt's perfect to be unangry if you are unconscious.
Wry smile,
Karen Hoyt
This makes me nostalgic :)
ReplyDeleteYeah,what happened to good ol' clothes that you disinfected or for that matter old newspaper!
ReplyDeleteHow very wonderful. It arrived through Twitter as I was performing some necessary tasks, which were not necessarily inspiring, and suddenly there was a light. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteThank you for your words, John. They capture the bleakness of some parts of some cities. There's a separation between the people that's reminiscent of city-ness.
ReplyDelete