The Station

The Midland Hotel seen from The Station, 17^th July 2023

 

 

Undermined by the dragging administration of life my

hope for profound or even coherent thought is

very low, despite the sun-setting drama approaching from

behind The Midland – that

white winged Deco

grace seagull curve with frosted atrium built

the year my dad was born: “extravagant

gesture of hope in an age of uncertainty” . . .

 

 

Thoughts I don’t want to examine pass

like road noise.

Canned Wuthering Heights from the pub’s outdoor speaker competes

with live R&B crossing Marine Road East,

and even the road signs now are either resisting

or taking on

metaphysical significance

– I can’t tell which.

 

 

If its good enough for you, then its good enough for me

runs another familiar ditty

clutching

waiting for magic hour, twilight

when the holiness of streetlights will elevate the sky.

Am I on something?

No

– nor would I wish to be.

 

 

An onshore breeze tangles the yard’s exhausted bunting

and the strung lights wait

somehow suggesting

– via Feelgood Dr. Wilko[i]

shunting psycho-zombie-like

back and forth across the stage unstopping –

the Thames delta

– to me at least

 

 

Canvey is a place I’ve never knowingly been

but the overlap conjures significance

out of nothing

even though there may be none in the end

just an ebb of impressions to give a kind of freedom.

“Can you imagine Welles – Orson – in flowing robes

doing Falstaff on Morecambe beach?”

“Surreal man!”

 

 

 

© Lawrence Freiesleben

Morecambe/Heysham, 2023

[email protected]

 

 

NOTES    Notes accessed on 24^th August 2023

[i] Wilko being the stage name/nickname of John Andrew Wilkinson (12 July 1947 – 21 November 2022)  en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilko_Johnson   See Julian Temple’s wonderful film: Oil City Confidential  (2009)  imdb.com/title/tt1379092/ 

The Station, is pub ‘poem’ number 13 – the restriction or encouragement being that they have to be (mostly) written at the time (usually while alone) in pubs (almost always their gardens or yards) and incorporate whatever crosses the senses or mind. Although the idea of forcing myself to do this only occurred in March 2023, I’ve retrospectively counted three earlier ‘poems’) including The best thing about dreams is not having to tidy them up at the end:  internationaltimes.it/the-best-thing-about-dreams-is-not-having-to-tidy-them-up-at-the-end/ 

In Memory of Nagasaki written in the garden of The Duke of Rothesay and used at the end of internationaltimes.it/in-remembrance-of-nagasaki-city-of-lancaster-august-9th-2023/ became number 14. 

The Station pub whatpub.com/pubs/LUN/187/station-morecambe used to be a part of Morecambe’s main railway terminus – which greatly diminished, was shifted further away from the promenade in 1994  en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morecambe_railway_station