It’s a gift, this evening: essay-free,
the cars passing silver, coruscatingly
ugly. I suck in the breath
of a stranger’s smoke, relish
the heady stench of chemicals.
The motorway is an overlap
of several confusions, and I stand
on the bridge above, weighing up
the distance between sky
and concrete.
These buildings of green and amber,
whole manner of lights
in windows, the signs glimmering
on the Clyde like the moon
on the sea and I’m still
out here, watching.
It’s so cold: the weird wind
and a Christmas tree in every window.
I think of the lines I wrote, all
4000 words incandescent and yet
it stings my cheeks as a memory:
the crisp vertigo of this bridge
and rumblings of traffic beneath
bringing me home, westwards
with the starry call of a drunkard.
[Maria Sledmere]
qmunicatemagazine.com 