A Stone For Going Home Poem by Mark. A Heathcote

I purchased the sun
and bit into it.
Juice running down my chin and neck.
A vagabond amongst the lost
Hanging Gardens of Babylon.

On the journey home,
I was left with a sticky, grainy stone
on the Ashton canal towpath,
devoid of interest other than the scent
of a Spartium junceum in full bloom.
It blazed brighter than the carmine sun.

It's ochre yellow,
a shouting furnace fire door flung wide open,
amongst the crumbling brickwork
of a demolished coal power station,
imagining the warmth its roots must feel,
drawing on heat still banked,
depositing itself into the foundation's stone.
Discarded men swung pickaxes and shovels
for as little as a ripe piece of fruit,
their salt sweated into the stone and mortar.

And a peach stone for going home.