Why this burning heat in the month of July
Which makes everyone perspires like the
Christmas turkey inside a hot ovum?
As everyone battles the sweat,
fanning themselves on the underground,
It comes back again and again cascading down
Their bodies in saltiness like the gushing Niagara.
Inside the anaerobic confines of the much
Squeezed carriages, passengers huddled together
And gasped for breath in the sultry afternoon of July.
Ken, if the Thames were emptied into every coach
With waters flooding the Underground
It yet cannot be compared to these sweats
Flowing down the bodies of passengers
In the hot summer of July 2006.
- JOHN ODEY ADUMA
- AUGUST 3, 2006.
