When the pestilence had left Newcastle
We sent in the prisoners of war
As an advance guard to clear the rats
And burn their carcasses on waste land
Between the town and the hills to the north.
And to these dry hills we then dispatched
The prisoners, giving them their freedom.
It is not known how many survived
Or what caused the deaths of those who perished.

The burial of our own dead we left
To the old people, arguing fairly
That they had an abundance of memories
And must possess a kind of immunity
To have lived so gradely and so long.
But after the carting and interment
In mass graves, they were required to camp
For six weeks outside the eastern gate.
We were pleased to see how many returned.

The rest of us, except for the wounded,
Small children and women at full term,
Sweated for days on the muddy bankside,
Humping up full buckets from the river
To sluice the filth out of the buildings.
Months later we might still catch the stench.
Few if any sexual relationships
Were brokered or resumed in this period,
But there was a brisk market in commodities.

Electricity has become a legend,
A concept the young ones cannot grasp.
And sometimes we forget to boil the water
Or lack the fuel with which to do so,
Having consumed it in the imperative
To forge new weapons and new defenses
From scrap metals of the past regime.
These we render down, though there are alloys
Beyond our ability to melt.

Elsewhere the future may be in progress,
While here traffic makes its way on foot,
Porterage being a sort of livelihood.
The insects having returned to office
With their doctrinaire policies, losing
Is what we appear to be condemned to.
Laws, so-called, are vested in hard hands,
But we pass our nights in fear of pilferers
And our leisure at knuckle-bones and hazard