On Barbican Highwalk
A blackbird spikes the evening air
and warns of me. When I am gone
it will revert to its warmer trickle
speaking of midged dusks, the
twang of flight on cat-gut over washing line
before supper, of the two of us sneaking,
hedge-crushing with giggled whispers
to avoid the security lights’ blare.
But we are not there now.
In the fading day of a
wolfwhistle summer
my feet strike the highwalk alone,
amongst brontosaural cranes, beneath
the geraniumed pigeon-coops of the Barbican.
A cello strains not-grey but still
nostalgia from a practice room.
Here is bruised purple. There was always,
in the yews, the possibility of an owl.
