We’re running, head thrown back so we can see
how fast we are, faster than the clouds
(today’s windy) and faster than the police
whose cordon we broke through at Waterloo
There’s so many of us and the sun is hanging
so low above York Road and is bouncing itself
off so many windows it has made a long
gold tunnel that none of us could resist.
I have the megaphone. This is not normal.
I’m usually the one with the banner,
windsurfing to rallies with someone smaller
than me, but not today – today I can see
my long voice spreading out in front
shimmering like a heat haze towards
the bridge where it blends with others
and we look like one, we believe we can fly.
We’re heading for Westminster Bridge and later,
after the stand-off and riot (which will begin
when some drift home and the crowd gets smaller
and we’re stuck and night’s wet-blanket takes
the shine off our skins, just before that woman
from Tottenham – Maria, I think – has her leg
broken by a police horse) will it prove
worth it? We won’t get to win this one,
but we ran, heads back, down that road and now
on days like this, in a certain light, I’m weightless.
Anna Robinson
This poem is published in ‘Well versed’, an anthology of poems from the Morning Star edited by John Rety who sadly died this week.
http://www.redpepper.org.uk/Well-versed
