12th July 2020

sunshine

as a thrush filches a raspberry

blue sky

© Rachel Green July 2020

first time away

and I'm homesick.

I love the city, the people

even the steel sky and the sleeting rain;

the Gilbert Shelton comics

passed around from room to room

and the ubiqitious brown ale

best drunk from the bottle.

He answers the phone with the voice of home;

of cigarettes and whiskey in his tea;

of dog's paws and the stink of coal

on the ever-running Aga.

"Three-six-two-four."

An incoming calls only,

red rotary phone

where his work pays the line rental,

and I cry

in the little phone-booth of the student house,

hoping he'll tell me to come home

but all he says is

"You're a grown-up now.

You have to get on wi' it."

There's Joni Mitchell on the radio

and a battered paperback on my desk

as I skip another lecture.

© Rachel Green July 2020