Ponpontis

Stare out of those dusty white curtains
As the sun knits a difficult pattern
The city is a great concrete eagle's nest
This room is a velvet foxhole
I wonder how many artists have thrown themselves into that flat river?
How many poets their poems?
What passion is framed by the weeds of this Babylon?
What seeds are being blown, mixed with cigarette ash, on the wind?
What young men are arriving with ideals to prove to the chips on their shoulders?
The church is renowned for the wolves living in the treasury
For the beautiful virgin twins who ring the bells on sundays
Every second man has killed another
Every officer of the law pissed on their station as it burnt to the ground
Those bachelors of the arts sit feebly in the park, discussing Whitman and Tchaikovsky
They all die young, of weak hearts, a phenomenon truly native to this city
Twelve months all come, and Five seasons all go, the people are unsure when the fifth came
There have been factory fires, airplanes crashing into libraries, lighthouse explosions
All disasters have been borne on the shoulders of the women while the all men wailed
Crying in the rain, soaked to the scalp and thinking that Judas must be walking amongst them
The public houses are all names after types of ancient Arabic poems
No ones knows when or how this started, no doubt from the sailors who first came into the port
There are five pubs in all, The Madih, The Hija, The Ghazal, The Zuhdiyyah, and The Khamriyyah
These houses attract the love of the town, as the alleys attract the love makers
And the front of the houses attract the fighters with their scarred knuckles
Their noses like the heads of newts, their eyes sparking with the light of lamps
Ready to remember the rules of Broughton and feel the stinging tear
The audience who watches briefly are mainly men and Elm-boys
Elm-boys being the name for the soft lads who are taken by the older men
Known for wearing Elm tree leaves in their top pocket or button hole
In winter, when there are no leaves, they will simply wear a twig or chew on one
If they are not to be found by the pubs they can be found on the Avenue of Elms
Smoking and sharing cigarettes, gossiping, comparing tales, most of the time complaining
At the end of the Avenue of Elms is the bridge of stone that often gets flooded over in winter
If it rains for many days and there is a particularly aggressive high tide, the bridge will be impassable
Once the water resides there will usually be a body of a dog, a goat, sometimes a child
Over the bridge one will find the light house, built on the foundations of the old one
All around the foot of the lighthouse the children will be found, scavenging
Looking for clothes left by lovers to sell or keep, for jewels left by swimmers in summer
Sometimes looking for Roman coins, which can still be found and are good to sell to the Librarian
The language of the city originates from the book of Babel, according to myth
In truth it is of Latin origin, a mix of Italian, French and Nordic
The City's name itself is a mystery, in Latin Pons Pontis means bridge, some think it comes from that
Although what we bridge is a mystery