Poem: Journey

Refugee crisis: poem

Journey

Festive lights float above the streets below

as the bus starts, stops and starts again

on the journey through town. Upstairs a hubbub

of world languages that resemble an orchestra

warming up. The occasional cymbal crash

of a mobile phone breaks the aural warmth.

It is home here and we feel safe so we dream

of monsoons, rivers, islands and the stars.

On Oxford Street a one legged man in white shorts

begs outside a Body Shop, old wooden crutches

to emphasise his plight. Crutches that speak of

another time, the train to Dover and an earlier war.

Our little world is well lit up as we pass through

a perpetual cool Britannia where style is for sale.

Around us the black cabs bully the red buses, a sign

that there is a gap between the gaudily dressed shops

and a war of salvation that is to be delivered courtesy

of a Pandora’s Box of suited rats, who want for nothing

but a conscience. The grass of Parliament Square

is slippery underfoot as the fiery speeches float above.

As one we have lights and some peace at Christmas

but for them it will be where to lay this broken body

or where to lay that broken body. Then weep.

Steve Nally