In the last spring, the spring of Covid year,
we ran feral in prison circles at home
whilst outside our rights were eroded
with full consent.
Please don’t park it on the bench.
Warning. Warning. Two metres,
or manslaughter charges will be next.
Rusted bikes squeaked down roads
powered by youth’s memory,
shops, hazardous areas
full of death, full of spoors,
where even money, filthy lucre,
needed laundering.
We did wash, I mean, not every day,
but our hands, our clever hands,
we cleaned over and over.
We washed our hands of responsibility,
of nature’s answer to our selfishness.
We washed our hands in drownings at sea.
We washed our hands in the last breath
of the old, and we clapped the carers.
We pretended, and we learned nothing
because instead of changing,
we spoke of going back to ‘normal’.
…………
Cath has had poems published in on line magazines, and hard copy