Tamar Yoseloff – The Lambeth Prophecy

photo credit: Daniele Zanni

 

Tamar Yoseloff
The Lambeth Prophecy

In ancient rain, tender gardens
stripped, I’m caught in the drag
of giant girders, soon another
luxury city view.
Unkind asphalt
trips my toes as I spring verticals,
rise higher and higher
through dissected sky

to find there is a God,
at least a guy who’d buy a round
for the lads outside The Pineapple,
his labours halted, at rest.

Progress.
Razing, sweeping clean.
I must take stock: the oak, the echoing
green, before I gutter, stumble
drunk.
The quick buck backs
the trend. This season it’s Dismal Grey
as in battleship, storm cloud, steel.

My days are numbered: little boxes
multiply over the city’s face
while I labour at the boundary fence.