The Aftermath of a Chelsea Monday

She used to believe that it held the world to ransom;

hidden in brickwork; consumed by the steel girders.

Amongst the tidal of tourists and foreign exchangers

 who with the train-hangers, wash windscreens

 sell shitty Big Bens and swipe her purse.

She once thought that at some point in her life

this vessel of frowns and bad temper would intersect.

The glamour would jump out and sing songs

and make laughter roar behind those squared black eyes.

Now she views the vain bereft the pained.

Those with all, wishing-up everything;

those with nothing, wishing for something.

She is now immune to the lure; the effects of this state.

Seeing it in truth; a place where people have silly accents

and shout when in whisper.

There, everyone is a celebrity waiting for their limo to the next instalment.

Above the prime-time cattle trains the butcher of creative souls

continues to turn structure into mush.

It successfully spreads its one-way systems northwards.

With the disease comes the swelling bellys and slimming gyms;

nasal-congestion charging and co-habiting strangers living ten to a bed.

She always hoped hot-bedding was more a kin to hedonism.

She's moving northwards.

March 2007