I wake to strange words
from the tongue of my brain,
which apparently hadn’t slept
a wink last night.
Hiroshima, Hiroshima, it
clicks, over and over.
I’d left the TV on,
the one inside my head.
Outside, that relentless
stream of unconsciousness,
the morning traffic.
Have I woken?
Strange terror of a world
half awake to horror memories.
See, it doesn’t flinch
as the sun,
rays snagged in the tram door,
swings a truculent fist
in the faces of
sunken eyed commuters.
Sleep walkers,
obedient passengers,
ferried into the forge
of hatchling nightmares.
The future also dozes with them.
In fitful dreams,
time’s teethed wheel clicks,
a mechanical god drops in place,
and millions fall
from a churning city.
Have I woken?
In Heiwa park
the crows seem happier.
They sing as they
skirt around this precipice,
eyes wide open,
glinting.