Response Poems 

Exchange Flags

by Karen Stanley

There’s always bodies

entering or exiting

the tunnels from Chapel Street

crossing Exchange Flags

talking to other bodies

or mumbling to themselves

rapt in thought, walking

aimlessly to somewhere else.

Sometimes the buildings

tall on all four sides

are claustrophobic,

and bolt-hole alleyways

beckon to another space.

I stand there in the middle

of it all, smoking a cigarette

while ribbons of people

weave blankly either side.

I want to be where they are going

not going back into the building.

Sometimes I do it … for an hour

break free down Water Street

to breathe the not-so-clean

Mersey mingled with the Irish sea.

It’s always grey – but in sunshine

another city looks back at me

moving seductively on a surface

of waves glittering like prisms

which shine a bright light

guiding the way out

of this square prison.

rooking Out

by Rembrandt Clarke

I’m sat in my office

Its a new high rise

modern development

full of vertical glass panes

light glints, reflects

through double glazed window

making a fragile rainbow

across scribbled Mondrian post-it notes

I have a view of the river

it looks forlorn

laden with silt

and the forgotten dreams

of mingling daily hum crowds

just outside the building

crisscrossing the square

feeding small alleyways

that must run somewhere

in the trembling asphalt cosmos

always keeping a simple rhythm

like a door shutting

the light being turned off

Cut the Juice

by Mick Moss

In my high rise office

overlooking

the silted-up river

there is only one last thing to do

now that I have emptied my desk

said all the goodbyes

to my ex-colleagues

and cursed our greed-blinkered

bosses

And that is to

switch off the light

even though the juice

is already cut