No splendour

A sort of sonnet response to Paul Brookes’ ekphrastic prompt for today. You can see the images that inspired it and read the other responses here.

No splendour

They build high into the dark of neon
and pigeon-misery, their crooned sorrows,
where there is no today, no past,
only tomorrows, layer on layer.

Dull dark heaves in the ill-defined sky,
of anchored cruise ships, where boxes sit,
in their perfect fit, that fills a need
for the great community of solitude.

Rodents climb the mesh of graphics
in search of basics, the crumbs fallen
from the table of heaven’s high,
looking for their roots among the debris at Babel’s foot,

where no roses scramble up sunny walls,
no one picks true fruit from a garden tree.