Exit Music

I
became
a stranger again
on the stroke of someone
else’s midnight.

For
all that
separation divides
still the distinction
is only a porous
border.

Faces
not so different
never quite the same
now stare from the glass-pane
cubicles where we are told
we must wait.

I
became
a stranger when
I was told to be silent
instructed to cross no lines
nor the boundaries
of state.

Faces
I was told
were not like me
whose strength of will
was not as iron as the fist
we were ordered
to clench
again.

For
all the
difference
distance makes
for all the distance
difference puts between
whatever sisterhoods
or brotherhoods
we have.

If
I fly a flag
it is only a sign
to bring all the lost
and lonely people
together
again.

BH, 2020

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A dour commemoration, this 11th-hour relinquishment. I say, 11th because, tonight, 31st January at 11:00 PM - Europe's midnight - Scotland is taken out of the European Union against its will.

A sore point and one that won't be forgotten. Now, 'the walls go up that separate the world'.

So, it's a sledgehammer for me - and a ditch for Boris.