the epic rolling green and brown,

the speckled rash of birds in the

distance and the rushing silence.

Here,

there is continuity and the

brutality of pure air

offset with the bitter-clean

aroma of fresh manure.

Trees are secured in fertile

soil, amid furtive teeming

multitudes of life that toil invisibly

around me.

 

It astounds me.

 

Terrifies me.

 

These lungs are used to sucking on

exhaust fumes and cigarettes.

The objects of my affections are

reflections in metal-shuttered

shop-fronts, and the glow of

battered street-lights

caught in shatter-proof glass

bus-stops. My dreams are snagged

in sagging telephone lines,

my memories are red-brick

and terraced, as vivid as alleys

defaced by neon-coloured

spray-paint tags.

There,

my feet drag me home

night after night, manufactured,

captured and spent, as they tread

on relentlessly devoured ground,

surrounded by the mating call of traffic.

 

That’s my natural habitat.

 

I guess I’m just built like that.