I’m in a little café in Newington Green.  Just around the corner is 14 Beresford Road N5, where my parents lived when I was born, so my first home and probably where I was conceived.  It’s pouring with rain on Wednesday 30th April 2008, and it’s some 60 years later.  I hang my wet parka on the back of a chair.

grey London
where I was born—
did it rain
that auspicious day ?
wet slate roofs . . . street puddles ?

I look over at wet Newington Green.  Did young G have his pram parked there on a spring afternoon?  I spill my tea and the soft spoken young waiter comes over . . .

The tanka “grey London” was first published in Eucalypt 6, 2009.