Don Valley, winter, rain

Air, a brute necessity, weighs down

On formal cityscape: this gaseous

Accretion looming, leering, like a frown.

They traverse grey horizons without fuss;

The car, boxvan, sedan and wheezing bus –

A fracture point, where ether meets the town,

Tarmac bed supported by a truss

In acid, sulphur, mercury, they drown

And sweat the nails and screws that built this place.

It’s blank and brutalist, this fearsome face

Of Portland, ground and cut with fibrous steel

In recognition, say, of all we feel.

They harvest tiny parcels made from light

And drop their iron darts from a shallow height.