The heavy shower drilled on the frosted glass.

We sheltered under one of the high street’s

open arcades with sloping glazed-roofs  –

a Victorian refinement to the resort:

shopping sheltered from seaside weathers.

We were, by chance, in front of Poundland:

one window displayed Pepsi Max, the other

Cadbury’s Highlights, both cut-price sugar.

The Bank Holiday crowd sheltering with us

seemed disproportionately stricken, impaired,

overwhelmingly loud or utterly

silent, with austerity’s complexion.

 

As the rain began to clear a man,

middle-aged, passed using a zimmer frame.

He was engaged in some angry, solitary

dumb show. A woman arrived, high on something.

She had left her whining pug dog tied

to one of the arcade’s wrought iron pillars.

I noted that ‘Punch and Judy’ was to start

on the expansive Promenade, where,

as for a hundred and fifty years and more,

there would be much business with sausages

and Toby the Dog, and Mr Punch

would throw Judy’s baby out of the window.

Only the privilege of good luck perceived

such a continuing farrago of

history and dismay.