Please note that the poems and essays on this site are copyright and may not be reproduced without the author's permission.


Sunday 6 January 2013

Wooden Boy: Bus note 35


.



HSBC, 12 Calthorpe Road, Five Ways, Edgbaston, Birmingham -- the West Midlands Commercial Centre
: photo by Elliott Brown, 29 December 2009




First day back, 2nd of January.
        Waiting on bus
        by bank (HSBC)
        on Calthorpe Road, alone.
Granite cladding and glass, an edifice
full of swallowed tales. Smart.
        It's cold. Grey
        undifferentiated light outside.
Frostless: no soft tiny stellar mirrors anywhere.
        The bus goes slow, in stages,
        till we cross the Bristol Road
and then the nurses come aboard.
        This is a waiting room on wheels.
        Box, temporary,
        to pretend there's respite in.


Wooden Boy: Bus note 35, from The Little Wooden Boy, Saturday 5 January 2012

 



   
James #2 -- Bristol Road, Selly Oak, Birmingham: photo by Moayad Hassan, 1 February 2009


Ashkan, Bristol Road, Selly Oak, Birmingham.It may not look much to you, but Ashkan is a real chain of grocery shops in the UK, or at least in Birmingham. Just a few meters from this butcher shop on the same street there is another Ashkan grocery shop selling Mediterranean and Middle Eastern food products. Do you need Arabian bread? vine leaves? nekhy? bajella? qamardeen? leban? or maybe canned harees? You can find it all, and more hard to find food stuff, in Ashkan. Ashkan, one of Allah's blessings to ease the home sickness :): photo by Moayad Hassan, 1 February 2009


Bristol Road, Selly Oak, Birmingham. What's on Bristol Road? Or what's not on Bristol Road? The University is there, the student houses are there and every thing the students need can be found on Bristol Road or a bus ride away from it. You basically can live on Bristol Road: photo by Moayad Hassan, 1 February 2009



Pizzaland and sunbeds, Bristol Road, Selly Oak, Birmingham: photo by new folder (Billy Fallows), 8 April 2008



 Horny Devil, Bristol Road, Birmingham: photo by new folder (Billy Fallows), 5 February 2009



Birmingham New Hospitals Project from Bristol Road, Selly Oak, Birmingham: photo by new folder (Billy Fallows), 8 April 2008

3 comments:

TC said...

What more would one expect of the Feast of the Epiphany, having been given this gift?

Do you need Arabian bread? vine leaves? nekhy? bajella? qamardeen? leban? or maybe canned harees? You can find it all, and more hard to find stuff, right here!

Mose23 said...

Thank you for posting this, TC.

We're a city built on various waves of immigration, so for groceries and takeaway grub we don't do half bad.

TC said...

And for poetry too, brilliant I'd say, taking this piece as an indication.

Our pleasure as always, WB. Loyal supporters of Organic Geometry, here on this (the dumb, or shall one say mute) side of the large water.