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
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Author:
Classicmister (
Offline) - Published: March 13th, 2017 06:57
- Category: Unclassified
- Views: 30
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Comments3
Good write. It can be very unsettling to go back.
Really enjoyed it. Nostalgic without being maudlin.
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!
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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