I’m coming back to the town
where I was born –
a small town in the country
with a market and shops,
a pub and a church –
but today, today no people.
Only I walk round the monument
to the unknown soldier
and visit the empty rooms
of the school.
The whole town is empty,
empty as a desert.
I have dreamed until
I’ve forgotten my past.
At the end of the street
where I lived, the pavement
still ends at the gardens
of the manor house.
There’s no one to ask
what's happened –
although the long
hawthorn bushes
play in the breeze
and shine in the sun.
No return is ever
what it seems.
what it seems.
Image: Marina Shiderova; text: Tom Phillips
