Poem 264

Comparing the human body to an office building … if office buildings moved about, socialised and slept in gullies up Aro Valley … I’ll leave it to you to spot all the anatomical analogies …

( … but I like lifts pumping for the heart (similar to an image in Poem 184) and the word jungly … )

The Bone Building

Here the bone building goes walking
lifts pumping in the wells
all the electric flex pulled tight
    and thrumming
light and air flow through it
the phones on the top floor
never stop ringing

the building goes walking
     in the city
of buildings green and soft
as plasticine swaying jungly
together in the air
sweet-packed with scent stiff skirts
of floor catching on floor
foreheads leaned together
in a high wind

the building
                      sleeps
lays itself down in the long valley
enclosed in night and blackberry
windows glinting brief reflections
of moon
               an eye opening
each time in a different place
all night it lies on its side
furniture jumbled against walls
listening to the distant trickle
    of its coffee machine