Wizz Air brings me back to the crawling lights of Little Britain,
a neck-jarring landing followed by bewildering ePassport control
ushers me home into this eccentric island with a poster for multi-cultural mead.
The clanking Siemens Thameslink train gets me in at dawn
and a discombobulated sleep deprived day,
but hey! I’m back on my manor and I feel the need
soaking up the seeds like a potato planted in rich loam.
I’m home, and it’s as good as it gets
to be back among my neighbours and market stalls
and safe behind familiar walls.
Pottering about the streets in the rain I feel no pain
to be back on terra firma, in the pub with friendly faces
I measure out my paces like a poker player with a good hand.
Their luck may have abandoned them but they still enjoy the buzz
of a pint amongst like-minded folk and a smoke in the break
between bad losses, but who gives a toss when the stake is just ten pounds;
it costs more than that for a round, so gambling’s a cheap night out
and about on the town like a disordered clown with a balloon
which pops too soon while showing off to the tourists in the piazza
for the silver and gold from seven continents.
Taking the train to St. Paul’s for a walk across the wobbling bridge
to that confection created cathedral of the senses
in the past and present tenses and an exhibition of Surrealism
from around the world, which amuses and delights
with associations of the night; on the river terrace we take coffee
then home along the South Bank, in full throttle for the Jubilee
creativity is being free, while Ukraine battles for its life
our strife is among the dysfunctional members of this island family
for minnow sovereignty on the internet of things and places
in a post-Freudian society where no one keeps mum.