What is it about people
What is it about people
Who want clean-cut answers
When all the edges are blurred
Who forget patriots might love their country
But still may not be right
It is such a small world
To get lost in
Nothing good ever came of isolation
None of the hermits I ever knew
Could ignore the smell of a good breakfast
Even after a heavy night
There is something primal about bacon
Although not if it’s vegan
There is something fundamentally wrong
With vegetarian meat
What is it about people
Who become upset over what other people eat
If it is in moderation who cares
Gluttony is more than just about food
Some of the greediest people I know
Are skinny
What is it about people?
Celebrating independence
Or thanksgiving
When they can’t even agree about
The reality of an election
Or dispute the need for a constitution
When sad men use it to justify murder
Blinkered football fans
Praise the owners of their club,
When they contribute
To the slaughter of innocents
Who thought they were free,
Execute men for being gay
Call out ‘difference’ as deviant
What is it about people
Who think they are the only ones
To know the truth
When there is little of anything
That is ever really true
Believe me, I know and yes that is
A massive contradiction
But it is a perspective
I am prepared to stand by
Just for the sake of argument
What is it about people who would make
It ‘just so’
When the best we can hope for
Is an approximation.
Sometimes in the afternoon
When my head begins to nod
The outside world impregnates
The solitude of an empty brain with wildlife
Without any need for recreational drugs
Or dehydration
Inappropriate imaginings can
Occasionally
Invalidate the serenity of quiet time
I fall into an altered state of consciousness
To gaze out from Parliament Hill fields
Across the low rise of old London
To the modern collective
Of the new City
Where cucumbers grow
Alongside cheesegraters
St Pauls is dwarfed by the hustle
Of new money
Teenagers wearing braces make a fortune
Before they have learned to shave
The city is still a place full
Of pale males.
It is easy to believe I am there
But for the lack of a cold north wind
To blow the cobwebs out of the corners
Of my reminiscence
There is a smell on Whitechapel Road
Chillies and Choi
Bengali cooking
Chicken shops and Nando’s
New leather from the back of a lorry
People flow with purpose
Always maintaining separation
Individual force fields
Keeping their distance
A river of busy souls.
Lovers walk through the park
Holding hands
Hoping to find that special seat from the movies
And all the while my head nods
The cheesy bulldog on the parcel shelf of dad’s old car
If my eyes continue to roll
They will bounce out across the floor
The lovers would never notice
Somewhere in among the glut
Of forgotten faces
There are people I remember
All my life they have been at the margins
Nodding acquaintances
With walk-on parts
A bit like having a bank manager
In a bedroom closet
Only stepping out when he is needed
A person has to be psychopathic
To believe in Schrodinger
What are they all doing now
As the television infiltrates
With a few lines from Breaking Bad
Pulling me back to the softness of the sofa
And quiet time
Before the madness of real life
When the truth of things
Fills in the gaps between what was
And what is,
Without her
There is only imagination,
What would I do without that?