Poem 21


A Wellington day when the soggy atmosphere slows everything to a crawl … RIP Kirkcaldies … the cranes locate it in the time of the 80s building boom …

( I love the somnolent trancelike quality of this … )



Rain

The baby is asleep covered in plastic
wheeled through town
sagged sideways in his pram he could as much
be dead this could be his funeral
rolling by Kirkcaldies and the shuttered toy department
on up Lambton Quay
the king stone cold in his capital
cranes all slumped
he sleeps and dreams he's in an unending grey city
and wakes and finds it true
and cries

            he sleeps
           Lambton Quay is a dream
          and his mother is in a dream
         inside her own milky plastic
        passing the sales by



Rain