I am like the east-end once was, too
not like you, in your old-world charms
more a smouldering widow, more like

whitechapel in the wartime. fieldgate street
burning, the collapsed fifty shilling shop and
gaping blank holes in the rows of houses.

visibly, you can see
that I am missing a few bricks.
I am a city, vibrant, of violent scars.

I still stand, despite iron girders
hanging off me like balloon strings
they are heavy, you know-

but she tells me that if I take them off
well, the whole damn thing will fall down.
and life is worth it, even if it is a siege.

I clatter and moan and whistle in the night.
I know you darling-
I know you forget your Anderson shelter

even exists, when you flutter your eyes and
get squelched tight in the peat bog.
you should go, you should go.

I don’t want you to die here
on my street-
I don’t want you to become a hole in the row.

I am a war
I am telling you. a total war-
and you will wish for peace

once you have seen past the
pretty pinny I wear, the dust-scarf
in my hair-

I know, I remind you
of something you know.
but I am not that-

just an itchy glow.