Then Sings My Soul

In Bond Street I wait at the crossing
and not wanting to make eye contact with anyone
I glance to my left and get
knocked
on
my
arse
by the sheer hip-hip-hooray of colours.

Someone has planted wild flower seeds which blaze from the grey,
making the concrete sing like a summer meadow
and I feel like I’m on a caravan holiday in Dorset.

My fellow pausing pedestrians aren’t moved by it
as they fiddle with phones or stare blankly
ahead.

I turn to a middle-aged suit and clap my arm around his
shoulder
and I say:
“look at this wonderful thing that someone’s done”,
and he sees the poppies, meadow buttercups,
corncockles and red campion for the first time and
smiles at them and we both stand and look
as the lights change from red to amber
to green to amber to red…

Ben Banyard lives in Portishead, near Bristol, where he sometimes writes poetry and short fiction.