SOFT HISTORIES

by the 
shop-and-drive
the
orange brick
new build
stands box-fresh 
without history

time was
site was
a potholed coach park 
of
cement slabs and half fences / an after pub piss stop -
in 
the
medicine light of streetlamps 
we would stand / swaying / emptying 
leaning and small town delirious
behind the green portacabin office
patterned with rust 
like 
its 
camo

earlier in falling light
couples would have stood awkward in foursomes
clothes too pressed
gathered self consciously 
on this nowhere corner
to
go
to
london shows on garish coach upholstery
grateful
of
the
height and thin bus walls between them
and
wild wild
imagined
city
mayhem

now
its hutch flats / limited parking
hatchbacks clusterfuck on new blacktop
between
snow bright white lines
all of it somehow keen
to
age
and
darken 
with weather and time
and
to
hide / worn / used
in
the
folds unnoticed