Going Back

Classicmister

Today I went back

To see the building where once I worked

Then a suite of offices set within a Regency crescent

In London’s affluent West End 

 

Long gone are those offices

As sadly too are many of my former colleagues

That building is now converted

From office suite to luxury apartments

Owned or tenanted by the affluent 

 

Do the ghosts of past employees

Haunt the offices, stairways and corridors

Of that old place?

 

We had no computers, calculators or direct dialling then

But typing pools, slide rules and a switchboard

But the well-healed occupants still look out

From their windows on the same vista as I did

Whilst I fretted over sales, costs and budgets

They watch TV, tap their iPads , shower and prepare meals

 

What has become of the Director’s floor?

With its large offices and front-facing aspect

Are they now the high-end apartments?

That building is now converted back

To its original purpose

As housing for the affluent Regency owners of the eighteenth century

Who stabled their horses and carriages in the mews

Which are now garages

And had servants living on the attic floor

Compelled to use the servant’s staircase

Hurrying to and fro with meals and chamber pots

Lighting fires, cleaning and cooking for their masters

 

And so that building has come full circle

And has witnessed generations of occupants

Who lived out their lives in different times

Some happy times some sad

In times of peace and times of war

In times or prosperity and austerity

Who and what will follow in the years to come?

Will those years be better or worse?

For those as yet unborn

 

 

  • Author: Classicmister (Offline Offline)
  • Published: March 13th, 2017 06:57
  • Category: Unclassified
  • Views: 30
  • User favorite of this poem: Garry.
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Comments3

  • Goldfinch60

    Good write. It can be very unsettling to go back.

  • Garry

    Really enjoyed it. Nostalgic without being maudlin.

  • Dunmoaning

    I enjoyed the description and sense of nostalgia but have personal reservations about blank verse- poetry without rhyming or scanning. Burns never wrote it that way!

    • Classicmister

      Thanks for your comment - albeit that the poem was posted 5 years ago! I too have reservations about blank verse and you will see that much of my stuff is written in verse - indeed it all was until a guy from USA told me to "Lighten up!" which prompted me to try blank verse which began with "Girl on a Train" and a few afterwards.
      Thanks also for commenting on "Yvonne" which I originally wrote about 50 years ago! That one does rhyme and I have no idea what became of the enigmatic Yvonne!
      Go well
      John



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