Mown Down

There once was a girl with blue-tits

Standing on the corner

Of a dirty street

Letting them sing in the lamplight

At half past five on a wet autumn eve.

 

Lucky to have them

Printed on nylon, somewhere

In China in colours to match hers.

Lucky to be there, at the dirty

Street corner, no care but getting

Wet through the wet autumn eve.

 

Moving into the twilight

She breathes holes in

The air, past the day’s paninis

Left out by Cafes for tramps to eat

On loose-knit streets

Paved over fields, gradually, down

Decades, first cobbles then tarmac,

Bits of both, interweaved, gum daisies

Sprouting pink and yellow and green

 Through each kink-

 

 

About to cross the road

The blue-tits stop singing but

She ignores their hiatus and makes

For the van, white, common type

And BANG

The blue-tits go red and

 Death fills the street.