Tuesday 10 July 2018

City Life (July 10, 2018)

Imposed ghettos
We hide
Like rabbits
In our sky warrens.

Steel glass and concrete
Constructs
Without sense of safety
Or soul.

Four invisible walls
Delineated by
Crossing streets
And avenues
That separates us.

Laid out
Like black ribbons
Of asphalt.

Strangers identified
By speech pattern
And body language differences.

Our clothes
Dead giveaway
To trained observers.

Scurrying like rats
Between adjacent ghettos
Like linked villages
Forming bigger community.

A city.

Everyone hyper-focused
On own needs
Ignoring growing distress
Of a fellow citizen
Until too late.

Breaking societal taboo
Doing so.

Emotional disease exposure
Showing compassion
For strangers
Sitting or standing
Beside them.

Moving from house A
To job B
Then back again
Five days/week.

Like rodents
On a treadmill.

By invisible cue
At 7 pm
Everything shuts down.

One could shoot
A cannonball
Without hitting anyone.

As people rush
To the suburbs
For shopping.

Small town forced
Into cityhood.

Therisa © 2018

Author’s note:  Written for this week’s Poets United midweek motif word prompt: city. This poem is based upon my experiences during the early to mid 1990s, as a student studying at Carleton University, in Ottawa, Ontario. The national capital of Canada.

24 comments:

Magaly Guerrero said...

What a gloom of a place. I can almost see the speaker hugging herself, eyes a bit wild, walking fast from A to B.

Therisa's World said...

Magaly, Ottawa was a logging town, before it was chosen as Canada's capital. Towards Parliament Hill, the streets are filled with large towering glass buildings housing the bureaucracy. No sense of soul.

Sumana Roy said...

I am scared of invisible walls breaking a whole world into fragments. But sometimes that is the city air about. Nice lines.

annell4 said...

You have captured the city perfectly.

hyperCRYPTICal said...

I agree with Annell, you have captured city life perfectly. Cities, full of so many people, offer for some, only isolation.
I recognise rodents of a treadmill too. Although I live in a town, I commuted (to work) in the city. And I felt like a hamster on a wheel...
Anna :o]

Therisa's World said...

Sumana, not sure, which are worse visible or invisible walls. Each have their drawbacks.

Therisa's World said...

Thank you, Annell. Although, this is one type of city that we can find.

Therisa's World said...

Anna, I pity you, if you have to drive in rush hour around the greater Toronto area. As it has been rated as one of the worse region, globally.

Susan said...

"We hide
Like rabbits
In our sky warrens." And then you move me between black ribbons and into a literal rat race. And this is an amazing image, too:
"At 7 pm
Everything shuts down.

One could shoot
A cannonball
Without hitting anyone."

We must learn to care for each other in order to survive. Sigh. But this is an accurate portrait of a city, for sure. Once the stars are out of our eyes, we see it for what it is.

Therisa's World said...

Thank you, Susan, this was the first time that I moved out from my parents's house, in Brampton, Ontario. A 4-5 hours drive northeast from them.

Sherry Blue Sky said...

I love the idea of hiding like rabbits in sky warrens. Perfect! When I lived briefly in Ottawa in the 60's it was a very small city........I like your description of everything shutting down at 7 p.m.

Therisa's World said...

Thank you, Sherry, for your kind words. Have been told, after the last amalgamation of Ottawa, this has changed.

Kim M. Russell said...

There is so much to comment on in your poem, Therisa, so I'll try to keep it brief. I like the lines:
'We hide
Like rabbits
In our sky warrens',
which makes me think of London, with its high-rises and towers, and
'Steel glass and concrete
Constructs
Without sense of safety
Or soul'
brings Grenfell Tower to mind.
The lines that really hit me are:
'Scurrying like rats
Between adjacent ghettos'.

Therisa's World said...

Thank you, Kim. Grenfell Tower is/was a totally preventable disaster on all levels that innocent people had to pay the price.

Carrie Van Horn said...

You have captured the roughness of the city Therisa! Yes it does seem that some small towns end up turning into the big cities. Love the raw imagery in this. I felt as if I was walking down the streets myself.

Vivian Zems said...

You expose the grit of the city... with all its tribulations. A good write.

Therisa's World said...

Thank you, Carrie. Guess, its the mixture of a hyperactive imagination and memories from long ago, being in a strange place for the first time by myself.

Therisa's World said...

Thank you, Vivian, for your kind words.

Old Egg said...

Having worked in a city for many years that death at closing time was almost hurtful. It seemed abandoned as though affected by atomic radiation! I enjoyed your piece very much.

Therisa's World said...

Thank you, Robin, it was culture shock for me, moving to Ottawa, during my first year at university.

indybev said...

An apt description of city. Seen from the perspective of an airplane hey reminded me very much of ant farms! Well written, Therisa.

purplepeninportland.com said...

'Imposed ghettos
We hide
Like rabbits
In our sky warrens.

Steel glass and concrete
Constructs
Without sense of safety
Or soul.'

Well written, Therisa, with soul in the details!

Therisa's World said...

Thank you, Bev. Ant farm, never thought of that comparison to this poem.

Therisa's World said...

Thank Sara. My muse got on a roll with this poem.

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