London Poem

London

Spending summers splitting our bellies with laughter over cheap fruit wine and Poundland biscuits with King Krule growling over the trees. When I was 16 I'd take the overground to Queen's Road Peckham to see my boyfriend and there would always be bashment or dub glitching down the train with kids in Doc Martens and metallic mini skirts cackling, slathering on foundation necking Cherry B like tap water. I wrote my first poem in Bishop's Park, the end of my pencil bitten, pockets stuffed with 45p Tesco sweets whining about some pretty skater boy next to a brown rivеr that bubbled as it rolled up towards Hammersmith. Whеn I think of London I think of the park police man telling me and my mates that we're guests to this country, I think of being drenched in sweat after a messy night with kebab grease around my lips eyes lead heavy, tears shed and tobacco lost. I think of my friend's mum being robbed at knife point 5 minutes from home. Violence, violets, vapes, too many bridges. My brother plays basketball in the sun with his laces undone and yesterday a stranger told me I reminded her of her daughter and offered me a rollie from a little gold tin with a dragon on it. Ravenscourt Park is where I moped kicking pink plossoms and losing frisbees and barely revising physics. Two years later I brought the person I liked to sit in my favourite spot on this fallen tree but I never mustered up the strength to kiss them. Instead we argued about where in London MF Doom was born and where in London William Blake died, burning through the afternoon until the February chill drove us back to the station where we ended up kissing, leaning in across the barrier, while the TFL maintenance man whooped n brandished his broomstick. Shepherd's Bush Empire is where I saw Loyle Carner make a room full of people dance so hard they stepped on each other's feet. I had tears in my eyes when I walked out of there. London has taught me about passion and it has taught me about the underappreciated nature of most artists. From the man who plays the sax slumped barefoot against the wall of the underpass, to the guy in the year above me at school (Seb) who spends hours crafting a single sentence his freestyles slip over the beat like liquid gold. Oh London you've made me see things so grim, so glorious, so unapologetically alive, I've watched men mash fists into each other's heads outside Spoons. I've seen a little boy hand out a crushed handful of daffodils to the lady who sells strawberries and sweet potatoes on North End Road. I've watched girls make out with tears streaming down their painted faces by Trafalgar Square at Pride. I've watched my ex fall into a pond blind drunk then scream her throat raw at the ghost who pushed her. I've traipsed through galleries on awkward dates and put my face against museum glass. London. My city of lights. This is where I grew up.  This is where I learnt to toughen up. This is where I grew up. Though, this is where I learnt love