11th of July
I
Through the slats of the garden fence I watch
the little gunmen run by, the thrill of power
glittering their eyes, their shorts half-falling down
around their scuffed calves. It’s war and then it’s
teatime and then it’s out to watch the bonfires,
pellet-guns stuffed into their waistbands.
The pallets have been piling up for weeks; a lanky boy
scales the rotten planks, skelfing his palms
to reach the top, shading his face from the sun
as he plants a swaggering tricolour. Tonight
the air reeks of booze; cans tossed through the air,
beer-foam chemtrails in the night sky. It’s lit
and heat roars from the tower, illuminates the red-faced
crowd: green, white, and gold flickering across their eyes.
II
The golden pillar rises, licking up everything:
the old sofas, the extra flags thrown on at the last
minute, the bedsheets spread and spray painted:
a circle with a bullseye, All Taigs Are Targets,
picket signs wilting, faces blackening, all of it
devoured by the frenzy of the blistering spire.
Through the slats of my bedroom blinds I watch
the bonfire burn. Only this time it’s not a bonfire.
They’ve burnt a bus. I go past the next day,
take it all in: the charred seats, plastic dripping
from the traffic lights – silent watchmen whose colours
still change from green to red to green –
charcoal petals twisting upwards from blown-out
windows, and ashes that glitter in lumps on the tarmac.
III
They’re getting younger every year. The bonfire’s
getting taller. To think I didn’t know that bonfire
was once bone fire. They’ve always been raised
like this, on violence. That patch of the field is permanently
damaged, the grass no longer grows green but grey.
There’s a long, black stain, like a shadow, on the road
where the bus stopped and didn’t leave again: the past
cast into the present. It’s bonfire night again,
but I sleep through it like a bad dream, the traffic light
switching, ghostly, in my mind as I fall asleep
from red to green to red to green. Someone fell off
the bonfire last night. They’re getting too tall,
the kids. Too tall to play with toy guns.