Human Luggage
A grey Huddle descends:
Hilda and Beryl roll the tide forwards
Although the wave is
sedate and unsure
Chris grabs Ben’s hand
off to the side
needing a friend
Bernie thinks there’s something stuck
to Joe’s right foot
Should he tell him?
He remembers when he had cheek
Head up, face front
Carl thinks
Quietness is power, see and be seen
Loneliness rattles in his pocket
They departed the rural climbs
for an urban descent
leaving and arriving the same day
Parted hair unruffled from
the stuffy train
Names on luggage tags
swing from necks uncreased from age or sleep
un-morgued bodies labelled
for delivery
From scuffed knee, to long sock
from satchel to carrier bag
They smell of the unknown
Its dust drifts from blazers
lingers, and fogs the air
Unitedly un-united
They journey and arrive
Somewhere
Letting go of Mum’s hand
holding a strangers name
In 2010 Emma McCourty‘s chapbook; Everynothing, was published by knives Forks and Spoons Press. In 2013 one of her poems ‘A view from the Top’ was published in the Sculpted anthology by Northwest Poets.