Nothing seems to change but the type of distraction Suits glued to phones miss fiends cutting fractions ‘Miss please’, says the beggar but all she hears is music Chewed lips seek water she walks past with tulips A soundtrack of crickets scream loud through exhaust pipes Rivets bend under weight Lights off alone…

A boozy shriek punctuates A roads Pockets lose change Crowds lose order Minds lose everything A city tries to find itself Odds grow shorter Hands grow dizzy Throats grow hoarse Traffic loops overwhelming Petrifying, dazzling infinity A million breaths rise Somewhere, one less falls Breaks a timeless illusion As if to juxtapose youthful joy Only time will tell our fortune We observe for it’s all we can do The responsibility of conscious How else would life find beauty Words find meaning Scenes find clarity

I’ve long stopped pretending to be a morning person. Tired of snoozing alarms five, six, seven times. Tired of being tired. Instead, I wake around eleven, murkily drift out of a strange dream where I feel nothing but endless heat. My ex-girlfriend’s called twice, something I might think strange if…

The venom in her spittle betrayed false apathy, a chisel tongue whipping the air. ‘Have you lost something?’ She hissed, a safe distance from the vagrant routing through her bins. He stopped moving. Paused a long unbreakable pause. She thought of talk to frank adverts and wondered if she’d been…

The night time fisherman of London Bridge. Last night, as I sipped a glass of saké for what I thought was the first time, my tongue spun a forgotten memory. It didn’t speak of dry alcohol or smooth musk, but of the deepest shadows, of a city at night. …

I smiled above the train tracks rumbling thunders. Laughed to the air, taste bittersweet. I’ll leave a little piece of me here, I thought. Waiting patiently behind the yellow line. For this town is the birthplace of my smile. The root of my hunger. It’s roads weave amidst the lines of my palm. Only this town can tell you who I am. Only this platform knows who I might become.

He’s depressed. She’s mad. His mood swings this way. Her mood swings that. But what are moods for if not for swinging? Head like the weather that’s part of life in Great Britain. He’s boring. She’s dull. …

In my dream, death follows me everywhere I go She looks out from every anxious pause, every hue and note She hovers on my shoulder like a caring guardian Casts a worried eye over my life as an elderly relative might For it’s not me she’s after. In my dream…

He drew greys across a golden sunset to keep her eyes on him Pulled clouds over blue skies to dull their flames. He swamped her thoughts and bombarded her senses A dull exhaustion forcing her into dreamless slumber. He gave her just enough for sweet comfort to embrace her Dangled promises of more just out of reach on every corner. London offered to clip her wings and she smiled and thanked him Dreamed of flying in the corner of her heart he hadn’t yet reached.