Why does
Public transport
Cause contemplation
Is it the sense
Of moving
Without moving
Of being still
Whilst hurtling
And breaking
In an ever-forward
******
Is it
Being a spec
On one scale
Of the snake
Of traffic
That slides
Across London
A writhing pit that
From a plane
Looks more like veins
Filled with luminous
Material
For an MRI maybe
Some nuclear medical
Liquid used
To highlight a hidden issue
But what is the
Sickness of this city
We seek to find?
The same queasy feeling
That rises in me?
Knowledge
A visceral lump
That doesn’t dislodge
With the stop-start
Rumble of the 38
Memories
That shouldn’t
Have been mine
Of skin
I shouldn’t have
Been touching
A neck my nails
Shouldn’t have been
Brushing
Whispered nothings
I shouldn’t have been
Rebuffing
You have a girlfriend
You have a girlfriend
A screech
Red bus tyres seem to make
Red
Red gullet
Red cheeks
Red lights as the bus breaks
And I alight
Still sticky
With the fever
Of a city of cheaters
And snakes