Gerard Benson
How it Was
It was quick piano riffs, just a ripple
of repeated notes, played one-handed, and a guitar
not too expert, competent though. We’re on our
way to the library; at each corner there’s a blast
of wind. The shops offer a lee. We can smile.
Someone has exonerated someone; it’s on the news.
There’s a new paint shop on the corner, bang
opposite O’Leary’s. The roof tops from a distance
are rather too like a flotilla of warships.
There’s a cloud like a fist, another
like a bashed-in nose. It’s Wednesday –
Swimming for Adults Only from twelve till one.
That’s how it was. A teacher went on strike
because of an obscenity uncorrected. Knights
in steel armour came riding, but not to the rescue.
Swords swung – and those spiky metal balls
attached by a chain to a truncheon. There was blood
in the streets running between the corpses. Nobody paid
their taxes. No-one left. There was nowhere to go.
Rising from the bed of his neighbour’s wife, an astronomer
thought he saw something unique, just a glimpse
out of the bedroom window. The hovel was no safer
than the palace. Even in the suburbs people began to pray.
But the future was already among us.
Page(s) 55
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