Saturday, August 21, 2021

King Street Sonata by Harris Coverley

Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata
rings out of an open window
above a long dead shop
onto the still warm street
just after midnight

the residual ale in my gums
my kebab in its foil bag
the mint sauce—the fresh onions

I wonder who would be listening
to that stuff

I feel like the sun is still with me
a little orange
on the edge of the eyes

the smell of weed
strong and bitter and punishing
like a rotting lemon

some quiet chat outside a doorway

the succession of single cars
going about their steady singular journeys

my worn boots on the pavement
the buckling slabs
the blue bags
the black bags
the shit unbagged and never-will-be-bagged
the grass in the cracks

the coating of everything
in a vague lethargy

the craftsman’s table left
underneath that open window

the centre of this town
the heart of a body
beating slow
as in sleep

and
Ludwig ends
and EDM replaces it

beauty only visits this place
in brief doses

and the kebab is already cold.

a five minute walk
like a fragment of God himself.




 Harris Coverley has verse published or forthcoming in Polu Texni, California Quarterly, Star*Line, Corvus Review, The Oddville Press, Better Than Starbucks, EgoPHobia, 5-7-5 Haiku Journal, Scarlet Leaf Review, and many others. He lives in Manchester, England.


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