Street Sweeper

Soft sun kissing the city morning
Concrete buildings of Woolwich Arsenal
Footsteps and trains to catch,
As I find myself here again
And for the first time
Watching the elderly street sweeper.
Some time ago he woke
Probably with the shrill assistance of an alarm clock
And before that maybe left a country which he had called home
Nepal? Did his Gherka father fight our wars?
And longer ago, at the allotted hour,
He pushed a way through his mother’s birth canal,
Her soft smiles and arms a welcome harbour
When he reached that place he learned to call ‘the world’.
Now he pushes his heavy equipment before him,
His weathered face focussed on repeating his daily task but
When we see each other by chance
For what will surely be the one and only time
Something cracks open –
Two old guys, do you see us?
Long lost friends,
Smiling, waving and saying
‘Good morning!’