Three letters, nothing more

Sodden, damp, and sickly warm, all squash and squish in a crowded tram; sharp, cold, stinging clean of crumpled grass and fresh-washed air.

Vague discordant whining, slipping in and out of hearing, leaking from a hundred different pairs of earphones, of a hundred different playlists passed; an oldish man with wispy hair, gently strumming melancholy chords under a greying sky.

Rocking, swaying, head-hurting uncontrolled moving, bumping, nudging, edging through endless elbows and sticky-out feet; light feet stepping, skipping, tripping on pavements, paths, the solid earth and fragile grass, no one pushing me but me.

The noise of voices raised, and the infinity of inane conversation, ringing phones and muffled curses, the honks, the growls, the jangles of transportation; a single solitary couple, lying under a slowly-dewing tree, he sleeps on the warmth of her, forming a ‘T’ of sleepy silence, capped with an ageing brown fedora.

“Hello, miss” or “Have you heard of..?” or “This won’t take long”, or sullenly thrusted brochures and leaflets galore; a waiter, lazing in the dusty yellow of a lamp not a foot above him, a cigarette hanging from two fingers, seemingly-forgotten as the smoke twirls upward, disappearing in the misted air.

The city crawling up an ever-tightening spiral staircase, twisting to giddy, dizzy, unwelcoming heights; the people unwinding, like carelessly dropped yo-yos, left to rest.

M-o-n and F-r-i differs little, really, and yet could not be more the opposite.



[Especially when it comes to walking in the rain.]