Sit on Stone

 Sit on Stone

 

Could be that the first rule,

is not set in stone, but written on tablet,

where you reach out, shove past, grab it,

send one of your numbers to the pool,

wait impatient, stand by locked gates

or sit, whilst your others gather

to watch, awaiting whatever their fate

like Hawks, no, not that, that's wrong,

Herring Gulls, throng and flock in ugly song

to squark metallic, streaked grey blue

like a synthesized overhead overcast sky,

and 'will it rain' complain your bowels

as you sit touching cloth, rehearsing chilblain

because wet concrete is hard.

Metal on metal but not Kraftwerk

or anything near unique, no no,

here’s your first berk, pushing past,

gathering his loungers while he may,

tossing towels from his dragged truck,

about other chuckers gives not a fuck,

but come you faithful, come one, come all,

these sides of pool make you seem small

underneath her sickly fevered plastic palms,

and the piper calls the tune. Eurobeats,

transfixed by your own, your others sweaty feet,

something flits fleeting across your mind

but what it was is gone, impalpable, fades,

flip open phones, suck straw, put on shades,

stare gormless into limp flat lemonades

like stones, and from fear of losing rank,

you guard against attackers from either flank.