Poetry Magazines - The best collection of poetry magazines online - Simon Armitage

I actually wandered into a super shoppin’ mall
several miles long
its own indoor city
the climate controlled to our ideals of perfection
the flashes of explodin’ colors
everythin’ movin’ quick
along the spotless but not lawsuit slick -
floor
bells and whistles set to hip hop pop street beats
every audible syllable
and every alphabetical symbol
invitin’ me to possess it
more crap to consume than you could shake a stick at
and if ya cared to try,
there was a whole store of sticks to buy for the shakin’

I expected at any time to hear on the overhead city sky speaker,
soundin’ like what the god of materialism might sound like -
in a non-offensive tone -
“Would the parents of a twenty-eight year old boy named Tim
please come to the central service center?
He’s lost and is very scared.”
But it seemed that if you had lost your child in one of these
                                                                                   places,
amongst all the faces
in shoppin’ dance trances
offerin’ their money-holdin’ leather up the loudspeakin’ god
that you might as well work with your spouse on makin’ some
                                                                            replacement kids
And maybe years later,
find yerself on a television talkshow couch
bein’ reunited with your long lost child
the child tellin’ of livin’ with other mall orphans
in the dark mall corners
in the tall mall trees
survivin’ on cups of sweet slush
and big pretzels

My head spinnin’ from all the herds of serious shoppin’ families
                                                                                  a marchin’
the sub-culture punk and gangsta tribes a struttin’ and gawkin’
at and alongside the young female hotties a posin’
I fell into the closest sittin’ conducive piece of furniture
there in the mall halls for tired and terrified old folks
and the patient and easy goin’ husbands
And what welcomed my lost ass
was a rockin’ chair
which when I shutted my eyes
and rocked
hummin’ a lullaby I can’t remember where I’ve heard
found a tiny pocket of peace amidst the chaos
and concluded that
this place maybe did have everything