The Petrol Station On Park Row Poem by Edwin Hopper

Fifties Bristol, playing on a bomb site.
I didn't think of it as urban blight.
It was normal. The Blitz, our Dad's great fight.
in the old days. Nothing now to excite.

Except, there were tall buildings on Park Row,
bombed, cut open, like sliced gateau.
Bedroom wall paper, exposed on show,
and a coat on a hook, in wind and snow.

The coat from someone bombed in the war.
A given gift, from one who adored,
the hero who died on the missing floor.
Coat hooked over sixty's traffic roar.

In Seventy Two it was pebble dashed.
The site sold petrol. Cheques were cashed.
Then offices built. Principles trashed.
Gambled and banked. Economy crashed.

I wonder today, who was it who died?
And who was it, went, to their grave, and cried?