I will add to this throughout the month.
In a city I know well
I watch people climb the skyscrapers around me
They each climb alone
But they all head in the same direction
The ambitious are seeking glory
their heads already in the clouds
The meek are seeking safety
moving further off the ground
I am halfway up a skyscraper myself
But I can't remember why I'm climbing
I just know that everyone is scared of what's below
So I am too
The glass is smooth and cold
The steel is hard and unforgiving
The climb is monotonous yet unfamiliar
And it takes all I have to hold on
I don't know if I will make it
Or even what will be left of me if I do
Maybe I don't know this city
As well as I think I do
I am a fox in the city
That scampers through laneways
And digs through rubbish
When looking for a meal
When I sleep in the park
I shield my eyes from artificial lights
I cover my ears to mute city traffic
And I try to dream of home
I remember home σπίτι
and what is sounded like λαϊκά
and what it smelt like παϊδάκια
and what it felt like οικογένια
But my home stood in the way
Of an urban sprawl
And I was helpless to stop it
And I was forced to adapt
When I wake up from sleep
I wake up into to world I was not raised for
A world that becomes less familiar each day
And changes faster than time passes
Each day I walk on less grass ζεϊμπέκικο
and on more asphalt γραφείο
Each day my diet deteriorates κουβέντα
and I'm forced to forage even more κινιτό
As the artificial world creeps into natural spaces
Wild animals are finding it harder
But this ecological economy of scale
Is costing us all
In the park I see pet pass me
Clean and well fed
But when they leave
I notice their empty eyes
More and more wild animals
Choose to put on a leash
And fly into the cages
Just to be fed everyday
But foxes can't be tamed
I am condemned to eating rubbish
My memories may just be dreams
But I don't live a nightmare
The blue signage always greets me
I can see it from afar
I walk towards the sun there
Passing pedestrians and cars
It has no right today
To be here anymore
The city is for money
But money is a bore
They say the culture's gone
But that's not what I see
Lonsdale Street is changing
But it's still my place to be
I cross by the Greek Centre
And the empty Westpac bank
By the time I get to Stalactites
I stop and I give thanks
The massive installation
Blankets the intersection
The people pass may miss it
To reach their destinations
If they just looked up
I'll tell you what they'll see
Blue and white city lights
And massive blue Greek keys
I look back at the Greek Centre
And it hidden classic art
Once you see it you'll feel the beat
Of the city's Hellenic heart
Less hidden underneath
An intricate Greek frieze
I remember when it replaced
An older one of these
At Stalactites people line up
A constant all times of day
They wait to eat souvlakia
Under the ceiling display
I've never had my lunch here
I don't have time to wait
But I've lost count of all the dinners
And all the horta that I ate
I wait outside next door
At International Cakes
At the front they're serving coffee
At the back I see them bake
It's served sweets for sixty years
I've been here for a few
Today will be my last time
I've come to bid adieu
I watch stranger pass the window
They always peer inside
The cakes so neatly stacked
Have been a source of city pride
Not so much the door
That only had one handle
Blocked off by a seat
Where you'd have to sit at on an angle
My brother finally meets me
We sit down for a coffee
We have a cake alongside our chat
Times like this I feel real lucky
MTV is on the screens
A different song on the speakers
Behind the counters familiar faces
Which have served us through the ages
The warm brown wooden walls
The comfortable booth seats
The glass cabinets that hold
Countless dense Greek sweets
When we finish we'll return to work
But just before I go
I look down Lonsdale Street
And wonder what it knows
Does it know its future?
And which shop will be next?
Will Tsindos join Medallion?
How long does Caras have left?
The caffeine rushing through me
Fuels my racing mind
My heart beats like a Zorba
I accept the changing time
Despite the change I'm grateful
For all of those Greek coffees
Drunk during my lunchtime
In the Hellenic Heart of the city
My books are in pristine condition
except for their cracked spines
but their pages are sacrosanct
and they return to my shelf
the same as when I picked them up
They are complete
Consumed whole
Ever young
Ready to repeat the process identically
Just as they want
But when I return my poetry books to the shelf
I sense their restless
They don't belong with the other completed books
They are different
They don't even like to be held
By both my two hands
They are short
And I finish them quickly
Reading as I would anything else
But I'm learning they can't be read like the others
Because whenever I return one of them to the shelf
I not only feel their restlessness
But one within myself
Only my poetry books
Want more than to be read
And they don't want to remain
As they were
They encourage me to write over their print
Crease their pristine pages
Highlight their white sheets
Dissect each word
Question their often tortured writers
And do so slowly
Its as if they can only return to the shelf
With a story themselves
Having endured and suffered as we do
But I can only give them this
If I break my own rules
and act as a child
ehhere 
Leave a comment