Control Zone

Who recalls the cringing silence

Of a town centre?

The cowed shops,

Already much wounded,
Blind with plywood cataracts:

Desperate measures,

Posted in black and yellow,

Forbade cars to be empty.

 - Pedestrian logic, these days -

Because one in a hundred,

Would be far too low on its axles,

For any innocent purpose.

A freight of kinetic badness,

Filling the boot.

Mixed with care,

In some Leitrim hayshed
Might consequently need
To be abandoned
Somewhere 'softer.'

The course of life and death

Made all the more perverse,

By the bombs
That never went off.

Following the flag

Shut blinds conceal

A coalition of wailing.
The dead energy used
To put a broken face on straight.

The journey from

Bungalow to Kirk

Is a hideous reversal

Of their wedding day.
This time:

She walks down that aisle alone,

Through a stifled congregation

Of everyone that knew them,

Struck again and again

By the voracious sympathy

On each neighbour's face -

Making it real like every nail

In the decorated coffin

Which left no space for her,

At the very altar

Where she once said
In reverent wonder:

 'I do.'