The Fool on ( Richmond) Hill

THE FOOL, ON (RICHMOND) HILL

Turner had long gone by the time I was in the picture, and the people I knew not so long ago had gone too though the echoes still bounced off the Thames like that sound effect in the old Floyd LP.
Why do come here, still? Don’t you ever learn? Even the Stones have rolled on. You know that old statistic how every molecule in your body ( and brain) changes every few years, so is it still me here? ‘ Course you could say the same about the river. But that’s just analysis and where did that ever get you ? Not here for starters.
The older you get the earlier you think the spring came, the earliest snowdrops you ever saw before the planet bent the seasons, early is the new late.
You can’t even afford to dream it, you don’t know a soul, go on or back home, the moment tipped to start again.
On top of the hill, it’s sweet but mocks you when it even notices, it’s London but it isn’t , it’s urban but arcadia, rock and roll but classical, a place you know but don’t, wish you were here and for that reason you never will be.
Flow on through now.

Richmond on Thames, 1976 / 2011