Bob Beagrie
My Street
The street is depleted except for a man sitting
on someone else’s step eating a sandwich
kerb puddles with cloud faces
quiver in suspended migration
and the dull clunk of a car door closes
on the musty light of a long grey day
The street, which could be in Ithaca
devours the hour, gathers together
its opposing distances
into an armful of damp laundry as the man
chews his sandwich and the windows stare
rendered purblind to the rest of the town
around each corner, the park, river, valley
evening’s rustle over a stark night
The street keeps hidden in the sprawling blizzard
of cris-crossing ways, held static
between two nowheres
and holds itself in sparrow camouflage
so as to remain unspotted by those
who would measure it for judgement
manufacture reality for another tired documentary
The street disguises all kinship
to the Barrow in Carlow, to Craigeivar’s fairy castle
to the submerged farms of Mirpur, the palm trees
of Asmara, the bomb-shells of Aleppo
to sufferings, mirages, last hopes
to the stony roads and the high fences;
our man has finished his sandwich
and heads off to find his place –
footprints connecting quiet cloud-faces
at rest in suspended migration
at rest in suspended migration