Toppled Buildings

A poem by Alex Boyd

Oh God, Godzilla. A theory: you’re lonely 
and clumsy, always roaring, pissed 
around people who disappoint you, always 
breaking buildings looking for something, 
you don’t know what, kicking at the dirt 
like a boy without a ball. A man in a cap
on the corner wants nothing to do with you, 
the whale in the water wants nothing to do 
with slaughter, the ice cream waits in the freezer, 
and you carry on opening stairwells like gifts
on Christmas day, knowing people are firefly
trapped in there – remove the stairwell and 
you see they’re doing an upwards jig, an ode
to possibility, completely unseen. Found 
in stairwells cracked like nuts, they’re soft bullets, 
slow motion sets of events in the making. 
Right in front of us, things happen: the man 
in the café didn’t see who tied up the dog, 
and didn’t see who took him either. It’s 
how we are to stairwells, instantly here, and 
gone. You wonder: what are they broadcasting 
from the roof, why don’t people see more? 
And what are you doing but trying to help?

ALEX BOYD's latest book of poems is The Least Important Man (2012).