Things Fall Apart

Things Fall Apart

News from Downing Street 7th July 2022

The vultures gather

Flying in from the sunrise

Early from the west wind also

Carrying the scent

Circling now

Ready

For the prey to come

Dressed in suits, tie pins

And buttoned shirts

Serious faces crowding the cameras

Taking in the collapse

In real time

A carcass thrown

From the dark door behind

Sunlight dancing for the final time

From the blond mop

And small eyes and a sad heart speak

Weary words

‘The King is dead!’

But will the corpse occupy

The chair?

A nation waits

Holding its black and red flowers

Dark suits ready

To pay its respects

And disrespects

A legacy of too many dying

Without a hand to hold

And behind those eyes and

That dark door

Lie all the liberation from twelve yellow stars

And the howling tears

Of blue and yellow Mariupol

Of a red wall collapsing

Presiding over things falling apart.