Pigeons at my feet
Forage discarded corn chips
Underground platform
Underground Scavengers
Organ Recital
Toccatta and fuge
Two words so embued
Musical terms clued
Toccatta and fuge
Put you in a mood
Feel the soul in you
Toccatta and fuge
Who’d even argue
A moment in blue
Toccatta and fuge
To give Bach his due
Like a Manet nude
Toccatta and fuge
Enables a view
And senses are glued
Toccatta and fuge
In D minor
What could be finer
Crowded
Even on a Sunday
German railway stations are hectic
Travellers, like bees to the hive
Constant frenetic movement
They ply between those stopped mid stream
Suitcases follow their owners
Like dogs on leads
Coffee cups and phones clasped tightly
Loud speakers mumble announcements
Delineated arrivals and departures
Clock hands drop down minutes
Pigeons fly in the station’s cavern
Surfaces spike to deter them
But they adeptly find wires and ledges
On which to roost
And survey this human landscape.
Foreign Shopping
Last chance
For foreign shopping
Hamburg mall options
Browse through
Looking for the different
World Cup Elsewhere
Watching soccer in Germany
Volume turned down
To block out commentary I don’t understand
The relentless back and forth of this game
Different nights, different North American cities
Players exercise their drama skills
With falls and tumbles
Urging the umpire to foul
Yellow cards are held high
Evoking indignation
Back and forth, back and forth
Till suddenly a ball lands in a goal
Kicked through opponents’ legs
Heartfelt roar
Players pile atop each other in congratulations
A win is a win and scoring goals
Gets you to the next stage.
Language Barrier
Removed
On the outer
Conversations abound around us
Unfamiliar sounds, cadences, meanings
We are in a pocket of exclusion
Elongated words which appear
To be four words in one
Create a grid of omission
My love of words
Leaves me frustrated
Wanting to comprehend,
Engage more with this country, culture, people
Regardless,
I’m constantly reading
Trying to make meanings
Can’t break a lifelong habit.
Walls Can Dance
In routine suburbia
Locals busy in their lives,
Walls explode with colour
Massive canvases of delight
And yet,
Locals are ignorant of their existence
They have become bland
In their landscape
It is we who want to hunt them down
Bunker Remodel
A massive concrete construction,
A bunker and anti-aircraft defence position
Built by foreign slave labour
A grey, dense relic of war.
Modern apartments built atop
Extensive garden winds around
A modern day Tower of Babylon
A means of re-use and enhancement
Everywhere
And in Germany
Sparrows dominate spaces
Ubiquitous birds
Bleak Memorial
Grey concrete plinths,
Like graves,
Run in undulating lines
Almost an optical illusion
But the memories it conserves too real
There is weight here,
The weight of history
Dense, compacted misery
Hard surfaces, strong lines
Shadows cast deeper grey
There is a sour irony
That this place attracts tourists
Phones and cameras click
The intended solemnity
And then they leave
Contemplation of the history
Of the vow not to forget
The sadness of deaths
In the face of brutality
The dense, compacted misery.
Moira Neagle's Word Addiction 