By: Noemi Elliott

A square,

with a slide and a swing

and a garden that sings with life in the summer

and despair in the winter.

Tourists like my square,

although it is no longer mine,

merely a past memory

which haunts me sometimes…

A block,

two-thirds new, one-third familiar,

thirty-three percent tangible,

the rest a figment of my imagination.

Goodbye Tesco,

goodbye Cineworld,

goodbye Paperchase –

farewell, old friends.

With time your faces become blurry,

the edge of the photograph receding like my childhood.

A shadow,

on the walk back home

gazing at the fading sun

as my silhouette stretches behind me.

The figure grabs a door handle, but

the sun is down now, and the shadow is gone

I go slow over the road

without a glance back.

A car

driving in a line

watching the ants pass by

from one end to the other.

A mere eight minutes, sixteen both ways, but

the journey feels longer.

A circle,

round it goes

the merry-go-round of memories

at the Saturday market

until one by one, each person gets off,

disappearing into infinity,

an empty void,

and one day,

I will too.