POTATO MAN MEMORY:  

 

Sheltering from a bitter wind in a high stool chain cafe,

a wind so cold it by-passed the bone going straight to

the soul. Bloodless knuckles clutched collars high round 

sinuous summer necks, isolated stares in throaty wools. 

Twenty minute lock out at Oxford Circus, crowds huddled 

like Arctic penguins without the etiquette of instinct to rotate 

outsiders to the middle. I watched an old potato, shrivelled like

a man, wrapped in every garment he possessed, held together like a

cartoon with string around the middle. I saw a man take solace 

from a tiny bottle, poke it’s head out like a tortoise from a ragged 

paper bag. This one didn’t use it as a walkie-talkie, nor was his 

poetry humorous, but long staring endless into time. Expressionless 

potato man pushed a greasy bundle towering on a barrow up the wind 

bleached pavement.

Hello, is that me with his lips around the teat like a newborn?

Was gratitude ever so cheaply forgotten, sheltering from a bitter

wind in a high stool chain cafe? 

 

(K)