Collection of Poetry - 16. This Is London

Cold, broken and desperate; united only by their loneliness,
I watch those poor wretches limning the harshly paved streets below
Turning my gaze, I see the vaunted splendor of architectural marvels;
Their revolving doors admitting black suits and silk ties.
This grey twilight: a blending of day and night; poor and rich; weak and powerful;
This – this is London, fabled London
A city I have always loved, but a city that seems so unforgiving
As I look out my window at the mindless masses.
With slumped shoulders and downcast eyes, they bear the look of unknown defeat;
They live in a life they cannot escape.
It rains and they can’t even be bothered to open an umbrella.
It’s as if time slows to a crawl – they walk, but do not move anywhere
They always return to their office towers,
wearing their starched shirts and polished Oxfords
These are the men who worship at the altar of success;
These are the men who are thrice divorced;
These are the men married to their careers;
These are the men to whom there is no distinction between despair and joy
And then there the waifs – those who absence would never be noted
With weary faces and distrustful eyes, they bear the look of the hardship;
They were born to a fate they have embraced.
It rains, and they huddle together, too hardened to care
Time races by them as their lives dwindle away,
Ignored by all and meaningful to none
These are the people who bow down to no one;
These are the people whose deaths won’t merit an obituary;
These are the people for whom life is one fight after another;
These are the people whose existence is as dust in the wind
One and all, they share a common feature: an inability to escape
Alone or together, they wallow in their mediocrity
This – this is the reality of fabled London
London of storied fame, of artistic beauty, of unequaled historicity;
It seems to ache under the soiled feet of the derelicts who live and die by the thousands
Alone or united, they are destined for the pitiless clutches of everlasting oblivion;
Their triumphs and failures mean nothing to the quietly enduring backdrop that is London
London is what they will never be – remembered
Because when they are dead and forgotten, they will be replaced by thousands more
There will be newly born failures to clutter the alleys;
Newly arrived visionaries trying to attain lasting glory
And this scene will repeat cyclically until humanity destroys itself;
Until there are none left to remember
This monstrosity, this filthy mass of humanity, this – this is London.