Sometimes

Sometimes

Even when sad, I walk,

As if I have somewhere to be.

There is a kind of pride in an overtaking manoeuvre

The fastest kid on the block

When I was a skinny little kid

Still developing

Into a person.

Carl Rogers referred to ‘On Becoming’

When there needs to be

Necessary and sufficient conditions

For personhood to develop.

There are times when I believe

I never met them

Perhaps it has something to do with

Cynicism.

So many supermarkets look like

They have reached the “end of days”

Or twenty years after the apocalypse

When the survivors have forgotten

What it was like

To stand in front of a cashier

As they sweep a barcode

Over the reader, not once but twice.

I still remember that feeling

When a credit card is refused

A bank cashier cut one up

In front of me,

What glee,

I thought she might be a zombie.

Whatever happened to a fully stocked shelf?

War and famine

Always go together well.

If you can’t beat them with a gun

Starve the bastards out,

Stalin had a way with sacrificial lambs.

Even on a walk

When the weight of the world

Is carried between my ears

On a BBC podcast

There is the possibility

That I miss a tragedy just out of my eye line.

Taking phone calls from the despairing

Perhaps these days

I walk on by, because like many others

I have turned my attention inward.

If it is not mellow Miles Davis

It is Guy Garvey

Giving me the Elbow

Caught in a squall

As I walk within a makeshift reality

Turning back the pages

As I go.

Walking in and out of my story

Going backwards and forwards through time

As easily as picking tinned tomatoes

From a shelf.

So much of what I buy is past its prime

Before it gets into the fridge

The cold air blast

Is so refreshing.

On a hot day, the freezer section

In aisle ten is always

A welcome place to linger.

Perhaps they should serve cold drinks

Cocktails with little umbrellas and glace cherries,

Provide chairs.

People might even interact

Instead of talking into their Bluetooth

Conducting a conversation

With an absentee partner,

Sharing details about their private life

In front of a checkout queue,

What a thing to do.

Keep the phone on silent

Block all unknown callers

It is the only way to keep up the pace

And to walk on

With direction and purpose

Without turning back.

All the way,

From the beginning to the end

Or whichever one comes first.