About Wheeler
At the bench, where insidious balsam encroaches willow herb,
steals its bees, a barrow wheeler parked and loosed his boots,
hung his tabard. A nearby bin ignored, he looked to a spume
of plastic which dragged the willow streamers, clogged the near canal.
His schedule, of packets to pick with pincered arm, his broom to bandy
along curbs, forgotten. Tobacco beard, his face tilled.
He had woken, head full of Tweets, late forum debates, that awful wish
to pin one true-said thing to slipping scree. As she slept on, he crashed
about, agreement gone to vanish-point on some horizon. Later, the boss
was all bluster, his rancour the gale to tip bins over. The barrow wheeler
said nothing, stayed tidy. On the tow-paths, passers appeared to mutter,
filth-picker, to broaden a candid arc. But now, he shakes a load
from his features, reaches for his metal grabber. He goes to the water,
its loggerhead of bottle-crush, stirs with fervour. The barrow wheeler,
letting litter loose. A raft of refuse tumbles in the current.
