City Sprawl Poem by Emmanuel George Cefai

in the wake of the
city
that sprawled merrily
and
grew, grew every day
sung like a ditty
the more everyday;
of a supreme thought
the underbelly: ah!
my Monsignor that was where
I learnt to measure
view in details
view under the lens
the supreme thought
make it bear more thoughts
sublime
offspring thereof;
then
in time a whole descent of
the thoughts;
that was where I arrived
at that level, and stopped
to take breath
but then
froze in the sun light
with no hope of thawing:
so resigned, with bent head,
I prowled round and round
in my fury-frustration
in the whorls of the net
in the city
in the calm
in the silence of palaces
and streets that be strait
in the expectation of dark
and of sunset and dusk
to look from the belvedere
from the high silent city
the Medina on so many other
towns and cities and
settlements.
on the whole of the star-lineages
the mantle of silver comprising
the moon
the mantle and me
we touched, communicated
as through a thought, then
more thoughts till
reason was sated.
the roll of the jazz was
the roll of the thunder
the flash of the lighting
the call of the crowds
the waters full gliding
through
mists up surged
from the levels of our Mother
the Earth.
I smelt the smell of the chemicals
the bowels of Earth
in the working
the belly of thought and
the sump of the doubt:
the pride of assertion
of assertion
of assertion...

round about the day
as it wound round and around
the tinkling of bells
my Monsignor the time has come
to hear me
to the heavens my ear I place
my ear
my ear...

and a whole constellation -
a whole, I repeat,
with the dazzling of my
eyes
I trace