Liverpool

A city with its ear to a mobile phone,
En route to a tapas bar
Or packed into a carrriage
Of its Third World underground.

A collective amnesia,
A reverie in Starbucks,

And a revving of Porsches
Outside the Technology Park.
Because everybody nowadays works in software.

The proliferation of lap-dancing bars
A pensioner's bus ride
From the Nostalgia tea-rooms of Southport

Where old money looks at new money
Now arriving
In full regalia
Like the QE2
Down at the Pier Head.

And if now and then the radical historic Beast
Rises from the Mersey to declare
These are the new modes of exploitation,

It only adds to the character
Of a city as memorable as a goalkeepers's gaffe,
Relentless as the Atlantic.

So you could even take your son
To where the ferries sail and say:

This will be your point of departure.
These waters will baptise you.
Everything you are or do
Comes from these springs.

K.M.Payne

If you've any comments on this poem, K.M.Payne would be pleased to hear from you.