A Tale of Twin Cities

A tale of two cities; 

The suburbs, I cannot recall…

One, to gain and rise;

The other to stumble and fall… 

A river of swift currents, 

Keeps the two apart; 

Flowing through the middle 

Like a dagger to the heart… 

The metropolis of greying towers, 

Where designer perfume masks, 

The stench of the dark, sleek suits; 

As in power, they continue to bask… 

The hamlet of shanties, on the other hand; 

With it’s tattered blue tarpaulin crowns; 

Must wrinkle their nose at the open drains 

And pray, that in squalor, they don’t drown. 

The megalomania of mansions 

With their blinders of gold and sea; 

Blink a thousand times at the brown bereft, 

Yet cannot deign to see… 

In such close quarters of otherness, 

Where the neglect would almost glare; 

The bought and the buried wheezed and coughed; 

As their tired lungs struggled for air. 

The premium oxygen of level 24, 

Made it necessary for inhabitants to stay, 

Their highrise apartment of brick and steel 

Provides sanctuary from gloom and gray. 

The tired eyes of the ever spreading town, 

Now look up at these monuments of hard cash; 

Weary bones and slow moving blood,  

Must toil till they’re turned to ash… 

‘Yet, were they so different?’

Pondered; the sociology graduate; 

Staring down from her ceiling to floor glass; 

‘But isn’t that their karma-dictated fate?’ 

That was all the closure she needed, 

Before she moved on in satisfied glee,

Below, a mother (of an age with her); 

Sat down to beg for food on her knee. 

And so it went with these twin city lights; 

Of depressing falls and exuberant heights. 

The river of currents flowed, mindful of class, 

The have-nots must not mingle with the ‘have-worthy’ us.