The Garden

    1

    And like a cobbler at a bench
    I return to my musings
    why Kensington Gardens
    with its grand, theatrical entrance
    is gateway to London's poor
    - why the stiff Victoria and Albert
    monument or grand canopy
    to the Hemispheres
    has a bison for the Americas
    or sultry elephant of
    Asia fame
    (India being the brightest
    jewel in the Empress' crown);
    why other archetypal animals at their pleasure
    are carved in gleaming milk white
    when the rich at their
    leisure, to and fro,
    dine elegantly as tight
    buds arranged on a stem.

    2
    I've not mentioned the poor
    come to the Serpentine
    a little ways up in Hyde Park
    only to be chased out
    of Kensington at closing -
    the cobbler at his bench,
    croupier at Whites,
    the elephant as a hatchet beast
    run amuck
    in the stellar pool
    of the eye's fixed poor.