A Bent Back

triangle of distant lilac, suddenly spotted
between two angled roofs and wish I were there:
hills, trees, tall grasses,
river clatter bubbling 
under with light, 
birdsong - 

rather than scarred by twisted
metal railings, hard concrete, ears 
trapped by battered engines, faceless 
thought, identical faces, regularity -
.  
the world seems full things lined and clinical,
tame and boxed, too orderly -

but sudden jumbles of crooked wooden fences,
gaily coloured huts, rows of green 
straggling vegetables - with one bent back working -
all squashed between 
ugly towered homes, brings

a gleam of something struggling still
in the crannies of the world: left alone
disorderliness sprouts like a chaos, growing
an echo of the past untidy and  
still warm  

we all wake from
a deadpan dream: see clarity 
enough to undo harm, re-build
to re-learn, digging to find 
the uneven truths 
long-buried under heaps of gold - 
unearth, uproot, begin

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