On The Goblin Train

Over the top from Newham to Waltham Forest, the bin lids changing from orange to blue (like how Northern France looks just like Southern England, apart from the pylons and the car registration plates: foreignness in the mundane), the silver towers of Stratford. Docklands, and the City, the grey gardens behind the red-brown houses, a trampoline over-winters in a back yard. Canals meander unseen around estates, willows wail into the water, waiting for Spring, and in the city farm llamas eat their breakfast and don't look up at the passing train. The last of the leaves loiter on the pavement.



In summer, dog days; in winter, black dogs days.