Untitled Poem

Who’s hiding in the trees? Who’s watching me through dark leaves, as I run through Battersea Park at 5 minutes to midnight?

Why aren’t they at home? What will they gain from the sight of hot breath on cold air and soft shoes on coarse gravel?

Are they listening? To my breathless monologues about everything, that’s wrong with everything, that looks broken to me.

Do their ears bend, to my feverish egotistical exultations, as my legs, gallop past two laps and push onto more sweet, sharp pain?

Will they ever emerge? And tackle me to the floor, and bruise and cut, my shaking sweating knees on the unforgiving ground.

And will they cover, My mouth with their hand and beat a rock, about my head until my brains are mixed with bone?

Will they then retreat and, find their place amongst the leaves, ready with a rock, for the next chap with silly hair that passes by?

I certainly hope so…