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Although it is not a burning bush it has chosen us. We watch it glow
past blind stars in the gunpowder sky to smash a crater the size of a mass grave.
Our houses are vanishing into the snow. We hold the Torah aloft in the moonlight,
huddle together, knowing but not knowing.
It’s pouring with rain. A red bus on Blackfriars Bridge slows in traffic. Gulls bob on the river, far apart from each other. One pecks
and pecks at something I can’t see. On the South Bank, the horse chestnut trees are decked with small electric-blue
and white bulbs. Big Ben strikes one. I hear footsteps running behind me and I clutch my bag, remember the lads
thrown over the railings one Saturday night. Only a solitary jogger, speeding up as I slow down. A train rumbles past; two boats
appear from under the bridge, chugging heavily. At the steps, a man with broken boots asks me to spare some change.
A reef of cinnamon floats on the top of your tall hot chocolate.
My green tea is still as a pool, curling Japanese characters
of steam. I hear the cub cry of a baby, cradled by her father
as china cups clink, swung into stacks by the cheerful waitress
who has striped our table with a damp cloth. This moment
of being here which is what we have; for now, all we need.
Our father Neptune banged his stave three times: the notes his throat made, long as ropes, pulled the city under—if we’d refused, we’d have been sent to try our luck on land.
By day, we squirm our emerald tails past scattered bones and tumbled cooking pots. The eyes of skulls are plankton caves. With every hour, the pillars weep more dust.
We won’t stay here by night. We know of sharks that trail a stench we’re scared to name. The city swarms with echoes. Far beyond, neon jellyfish pulse upward, searching.
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