It’s such a filthy river where
the shopping trolleys dive then die in vain,
a seasonless reminder that
the bed’s been shat, the ooze attacks
the nose, the lack attacks the eyeballs
where I used to push you to the
outlet centre and you’d hoot - in the
dark pissy pass between the bins that overflow
with small town deeds undone
beneath the railway - you still do, to wit, to woo,
and I’m still required
with stern and stifled laugh
to steer you off the lightning cycle path -
you name the pylon by the depot
the Eiffel tower … why not, this slimy
Seine is all we’ve got.
Between the needles and the beer cans,
you saw, last Saturday, a single family of swans,
two parents and three chicks, hard to spot
below the zealot banks of nettles
and complacent weeds, you made me stop
and we discussed their history, whether perhaps
they were the poorer cousins of some
Canterbury congregation or perhaps republicans in exile,
distrusted of Tunbridge Wells.
It’s not swan country round here, I said,
it’s duckling country,
it’s an ugly duckling country.
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