walking today,

the weight of this sunlight is pressing hard on old shoulders

around and into this much older town,

there’s a castle here in the distance, I can see its silhouette and

it looks like it's been drawn by that five year old

who was asked to draw a fort.

The sidewalks are cleaner here than in any city,

the trashcans never get full and the few cars are

different colours.

The meat in the butcher’s window looks

too alive to sell

and the generous bookshop doesn’t have a sale on.

The high street (from a certain angle) is just short of three horses

tethered outside a saloon,

but it’s the two well dressed children

standing on the hoop of a footbridge with

who I suppose is mum and dad,

throwing pooh sticks into the slow creep of a summer stream

that made me realise how far I’d travelled

and that I was very

nearly there.