I leave you in the middle of town
I hope you have a map
to get back to the bus station

Over a cider in the posh end of town
which probably cost us both more
than we could afford

after our afternoon's talk of Tolstoy
& a shared love of Enid Blyton
& musicians we both loved

we talked of what the current government
was doing to the British poor
& you told me of your own

straightened circumstances
as a child, relying on food parcels
from the Church to stay alive

& I told you how in the Soviet Union
& during the Perestroika
there was never any food in the shops

for anyone & how my mother
queued for hours to get a single pint of milk
not knowing if she'd get it

& how our life changed
when we came here
for the better

we come from different worlds,
each has had their problems
this & Poetry is what connects us.