Document 1401

Broken sleep

Author(s): James Hiddo Moncrieff

Copyright holder(s): James Hiddo Moncrieff

Daffodils don't grow here
On this grey granite city crag.
Only the sound of seagulls
Nesting - cliff-face sounds.
Ravens and seagulls flood
The rooftops and the early evening sky
With their acrobatic glide and twisting stall
And the shalder runs a noisy boundary
On the slopes of this Georgian
Gormengast.

I fly in like a homing pigeon
To roost within its walls.

Midnight and an old bull
Bellows his anguish down the hall.
A young woman rattles her cage
And mine - deaf on methadone.
All around me, heavy breathing
From the others trapped here.

Fire-flies flit the open spaces.
The monsoon arrives
With the tinkling of bells
And old age stares back
From the bed opposite.
A cricket perched on a tripod
Rubs its legs all night long
And the young worker bees
Toil like ants.
Daylight flies in on a predatory wing
To claim the empty space behind
Your curtain and the gap against the wall.
The drones are silent.

Breakfast arrives with the drawn curtains
The babble of new voices
And the day begins anew
As the telephone rings.

Information about Document 1401

Broken sleep