Present Tense

This brittle air in sun so low

Glints off flints flash hard

To retain the joy of childhood

As manners evolve in new-formed slow queues

Found on familiar streets

Beside the sign, Stay Home, don’t be S^Helfish 

Outside the closed café that specialised in crab sandwiches, 

That H added by hand, by night

Lightens this dull conspiracy of compliance

In which all have dressed down

Even priests can go uncollared in isolation

Because we can

Grass verges spout unruly inflorescences and ticking time-bombs of dandelion clocks about to blow

I let the news headlines go

Fuck ‘em! They add nothing to our here and now

Where St George and the Dragon adorn the brick cornice of the shuttered pub

I hear the sea and bees

I fear my own stupidity more than that of others

I long to be able to walk out on the pier

To its very end

.

n.b. http://www.napowrimo.net Day 25 prompt: Almanac prompt.

Christopher Perry

27^th April 2020