Barbed Wire Disease

A one mile queue in the car lane

all the way down the hill

bus lane so empty you could roll 

an apple down it.

 

But we’re just soppy lemmings

Ready for the squeeze 

Living things oozing at stops

Trees with a silly disease. 

 

One shagged old bus arrives 

But it’s too full to get on

It sidles by with a splutter

Us standing there like penguins

On a slippery slab of rock. 

 

There’s nothing for it but a walk

No use waiting to be put out

I won’t mind if one passes me by

I lie

fifteen minutes lost

Waddling down the hill.

 

TFL? 

TFA more like

Twits Fail All!

Oh, but there’s The Elizabeth Line! 

 

Down and down the tube I swoop

Thinking I’m Rod Taylor in The Time Machine

Ready to scream to the crowd

‘Go back! You must go back!’

But there’s not much left in me.

 

The smell acrid and hot

A sauna of smog

Invisible toxins spewed

From tunnel to platform.

 

I watch as people assume their place

The least dirty seats taken first

A poster reads the riot act on staring

But we’re all in a world of our own.

 

Everyone’s wearing ear pods 

Or glued to a book or a phone

Everyone’s sucking it all up 

So I can’t even have a moan.