I don’t write much (hardly at all) these days, but here’s a poem that came into my head recently on the train to Southampton, inspired by some photos of Paris taken ten years ago, which had popped up on my computer earlier that morning.
The Last Time I Saw Paris
And that was Paris in the bitter end of winter,
gloves and woolly hats, and shoulders hunched
against the looming sky and constant drizzle.
Tourist queues outside the Louvre,
umbrellas by the Quai D’Orsay.
Bedraggled awnings on the Left Bank.
The Seine, grey and growling, spits dirty waves
in disgust at a sad busker
on the lower embankment.
Battered snowdrops in the Tuileries
and veteran Maquisards in flat caps and berets
blink rain from their rheumy eyes to see the boules.
Gloomy cafes and sulky waiters,
Linda Rushby 25 February 2022
not even the coffee is warm enough.
Paris in the (not quite) spring.
Southsea Storytellers 