THE CITY OF LONDON
Early morning after a thunderous night I can breathe easy.
If I’m quiet I may hear the sound of birdsong.
Sometimes there is a mist. It hangs over London like a veil.
Soon empty streets will heave with massing crowds,
but until then all London is at peace.
The gentle tinkling of milk bottles breaks the quiet
and the smell of bacon and fried bread
waft through the chill morning air.
Distant sounds of sirens fill my head and
concrete rises heavenward filling my eyes,
crushing their foundations through my soul.
A sickness seeps through me,
everything beautiful has gone.
“Morning paper, read all about it! ”
Girls hurry buy in tight blue jeans,
men in suits, some in Mac’s, high-heeled ladies,
clicky, click, clack.
Poor old tramp, fingernails black,
stirs on the floor beside a closed door,
‘Got the price of a cuppa luv’, he calls.
The girl quickens her pace.
A couple kiss in tender bliss
A young man sighs, a baby cries,
an old lady dies on the streets of London.
Early morning after a thunderous night you can
breathe easy, all London is at peace……..If you’re
very quiet you may even hear the sound of birdsong.
“The City of London, during working hours is a bustling hive of activity but just before the ‘rush hour’ there is peace. I wrote this in the middle of the night, many years ago. My mind went back to those times when I was young and used to go, with my brother to London to visit my Grandfather. We would always stop to walk through the City and my brother would point out places of interest being much older than me, 14 years older in fact! There was a mist that morning and a fine rain that seemed to lick at my lips. The tranquillity of the early morning streets was rudely broken by people coming into the City to work [...]”
(from PoemHunter.com)
