Transport for London

The streets smell of wet dog,
gum pocked.

Gusts of over sweet, over cheap, Kush wafts over me,
as fleeting as a wish, as solid a memory.
And I,
Enter the Cave, belching its Hadidian gloom.

Then Descending, descending with slow motion,
with no motion.
And there they are there,
the living dead.
The drones, the clones,
the loners. All the skeletons are out of the closet.
And they are scurrying, hurrying.
But where to?

Then the smell of burnt metal and old breath
And I am choking.
And two ways are turning into 6,
Why are they in the way?
They are in my way.
Packages and baggages
Wheeled lives led down obediently.
Eyes down, focus and fix
Don’t look up, don’t speak, just The rhythm of,
Get there, get there, get there.

Immersion, and i’m on.
Whoosh and clatter, ears ripped with the rumble and screech
the ghostly labour screams of the industrial revolution, trapped down here
and revolting against me and my streamline needs.
It goes on and on, and the lighting is hurting
End-out of reach.
Suffocating hot,
But its Fast, its very fast
Signs, and poems, and warnings
Workers and shirkers and prams
Shoppers and hoppers and he’s on poppers.
And Dads just coming home from work now.

On and on. And it’s roaring.
The Fates jump on at Camden Town,
and they stare at me from gothic eye make up,
and I know them because the darkness shines out,
and they chew the gum, chew the gum
And I know that they know, that I know they know,
because their bones are made out of time.

It’s so slow, but it’s fast. Transient .
Musicians traditions, then,
a Kafkaesque bug crawling in the corner, so much bigger when you can’t
get out, its staring at me from the grime
And i’m panicked, and i’m stiff,
As the hungry ghosts surround me,
Their chasms of pleading Making me queasy,
And my mouth taste’s of old tin cans
My tension crouching, wolverine.
Then there’s push and jostle
Is is over? As if.

But then…
I see someone Beautiful they are floating, Ethereal,
and i’m present again and grounded.
And the metalised voice orientates me,
like a mother, a teacher, a lover…
Im nearly there.
then ever Ascending,
The literal light at the end of a choked tunnel
Ever beckoning
Because it’s over
And I propel myself out into the air, I can breathe, and I can see the sky
And I breathe,
and I love London once again.

I Now Pronounce You

I now pronounce you
Lone and crone
Jilted bride
Wilted wife
Sullen spouse
Tattered host
Banished bloom
Tarnished gloom
Divorced ghost
Sagging spirit
Jagged heart
Ragged part
Nagging hag
Reborn self
Off the shelf
Bombastic She
Fantastic Me
Memory
Was then, this
Is now, and
I shed my
Skin to find
My soul kin.
Just for now
Alone but
I hear that
Song I sing
Along and know
That soon I
Will
Be
Heard.